


Written on a Bullet

by kasviel



Category: Batman (Comics)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Rivalry, Spanking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-06
Updated: 2020-11-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:07:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 9
Words: 54,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27409306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kasviel/pseuds/kasviel
Summary: Alternate Universe. Will Bruce's past affair with Floyd Lawton compromise Batman's plan to take him down? Or will Batman ruin Bruce's shot at love? The first romantic conflict of many for this version of Bruce Wayne.
Relationships: Floyd Lawton/Bruce Wayne
Kudos: 6





	1. New Friends, Old Lovers

[November 20, 2014, Gotham City]

Two years had passed since Bruce Wayne's return to Gotham City. Two years come and gone, and yet Bruce still felt like a stranger in his own land. It was neither the first nor the worst time Gotham City had surprised him, and he knew it would not be the last. Still, it felt surreal to be standing here in the grand ballroom of the Gotham Regal Hotel enjoying the glitzy party while he knew the city outside was busy driving itself mad.

Bruce sipped the sparkling cider that he passed for champagne, and gazed wistfully out the window. Most of the police force was here at the annual Wayne Foundation-hosted Ball in Blue, dedicated to honoring local law enforcement. How many criminals would be taking advantage of tonight's distraction? How many plots were going down? He itched to be away and immersed in the night. If Batman did not make an appearance soon, the city would pay a high price, but Bruce Wayne was obligated to spend at least an hour at the Ball in Blue. Once Commissioner James Gordon made his speech, he would go. He knew that Gordon must be as eager as he was to get back to protecting the city, and owed him at least that much.

Nonetheless, Bruce needed a moment away from the idle gossip and callous laughter. The ballroom was on the third-highest floor of the Regal, and Bruce headed through the glamorous crowd towards a balcony. It was a frigid November night, and he knew it would be empty. He passed Gordon in the crowd, and happened to pick up on a conversation he was having with Harvey Dent, the newly elected District Attorney.

“Smile, Harvey.”

“I been smilin' so long my face hurts.”

“It's good exercise, Mr. District Attorney.”

Harvey Dent used the excuse of a drink to alleviate his aching face. His forehead wrinkled into a frown then, and he rubbed his cheek. Bruce paused a few feet from the two men, taking notice of Harvey Dent for the first time. He was tall, though not so tall as Bruce, and none of the hundreds of photos the press bombarded the city with during his campaign did him justice: Dent's finely carved features looked sculpted by a Renaissance artist, the lines of his face straight and strong despite a sensuous curve of the mouth and long, dark lashes framing deep, dark eyes. It was no wonder that the press had dubbed him an Apollo, and the White Knight of Gotham: he was moral, beautiful, and devoted. Now he saw how Harvey had inspired the city to believe in him.

Bruce's impression was slightly offset by a scowl that overtook Dent's handsome face. He was making small talk with some of the guests, but there was a sharp, cynical tone to his remarks. Fortunately, he was charming enough that no one but Bruce and Gordon noticed.

“Okay, okay,” Jim said, interrupting the conversation before Harvey's tongue got him in trouble. “I think we should get some air.”

With a hand on Dent's shoulder, Gordon led him out to the balcony. Grumbling and taking another drink, Harvey followed. Bruce went after them, though he kept at a distance. The air was freezing outside, but at least it was relatively quiet. Harvey set his drink on the balcony ledge and exhaled wearily, breath frosting the air white.

Gordon eyed Harvey warily. The stress of a harrowing campaign had not worn off yet, though Harvey had won the election two weeks ago. Though he looked like a million dollars in that tuxedo, Gordon knew Harvey was far more comfortable with his sleeves rolled up while he stalked the police station, trying to gather enough evidence to convict the high-profile criminals that haunted Gotham City. He was neither one of the police being honored tonight nor a rich benefactor of the ball, and had no interest in these functions. With the campaign over, his polished political facade was wearing very thin.

“Where is Gilda tonight?” Gordon asked. “She isn't still in hiding, is she?”

“She is,” Harvey said quietly, staring out at the city. “It's the death threats, you know she was never good at handling them. I tell her they don't mean anything, but she knows they very well could. All it takes is that one, you know?”

“I'm sorry.”

“Don't be, we … ” Harvey's brow furrowed. “We could use the time apart.”

Gordon knew better than to comment.

“It's no one's fault, it's just that she didn't sign up for this,” Harvey explained. “Mob bosses coming up to us in public with veiled threats, letters from psychos coming to our house. Every time she even starts to think of having a kid, she realizes the kid would just be another … ” He swallowed hard. “That the kid would be another target.”

“Christ, Harvey--”

“And who am I kidding? We both know she's right,” Harvey said. “Thing is, _I_ don't care. I won't let myself be afraid. But where does that leave her?”

Gordon nodded understandingly.

“It's toughest on the families. Always has been, always will be.” He lit a cigarette, inhaled smoke. “She'll either get used to it … or not.”

“Yeah, I know,” Harvey said. He reached for his glass again. “The worst part is the waiting, waiting for it to go one way … or the other.”

Gordon nodded.

“Like the election,” Harvey said, changing the subject. “God, I thought the suspense was going to kill me. Then I win, I get into office, and what? For what? To waste my nights going to parties?”

“Harvey,” Gordon warned. “Don't start.”

Harvey grinned, a mirthless and hard expression.

“Still having to remind the politician to be polite, Jim?” He downed the rest of his drink. “Be polite. Yeah, I'll be polite. Smile and tell all these generous patrons how happy I'll be to kiss their—”

“Harvey.” Gordon took the empty glass from him, set it back down on the balcony. “I think that's enough for one night.”

“Oh you think so, huh?”

Gordon removed his glasses and squeezed the bridge of his nose. Harvey was eloquent and passionate, but when his temper surfaced, it was as hot as hell. Some of the polish fell off his speech, lending it the harsh bite of a deep urban accent. He had not come up from the entitlement the ball's hosts had, though hardly any of them knew it. He had arrived here through tireless work and devotion—nothing more.

 _Nothing less, either, and that's what makes him such a good prosecutor,_ Gordon thought. _But that temper, jeez, that temper …_

Meanwhile, Bruce decided that it was time to meet Mr. Harvey Dent. He casually strolled out onto the balcony, remarking, “Cold out here, isn't it?”

Harvey turned to him. Cold as the night was, the scorn in his smile was colder. Bruce was somewhat amused by the look. Gordon looked nervous. He had known Bruce for years, and was obviously anxious for Harvey to make a good impression on the man that primarily funded the Ball in Blue.

“Ah, good to see you, Bruce,” Gordon said immediately, shaking the man's hand. “Have you two met?”

Bruce turned to Harvey, smiling amiably. “No, I don't think we have.”

“Well. Bruce Wayne, this is Harvey Dent, our newest District Attorney,” Gordon introduced them. “Harvey, this is Bruce Wayne, the—”

“The guy that throws this party, yeah.” Harvey took Bruce's hand in his own and squeezed it, hard. “I know.”

Bruce shook his hand. He was tempted to grip Dent's hand back with equal force, but restrained himself. This man seemed to be out for a fight.

“Pleasure.”

“I appreciate your generosity, almost as much as Jim here does,” Harvey said. His grip on Bruce's hand tightened. “Even if you didn't vote for me.”

Gordon stiffened. “Harvey.”

“Actually, I did. I also made a donation to your campaign, anonymously,” Bruce said. He glanced at his hand, and squeezed back with more strength. “I try to keep my political leanings private. Especially to stay away from the slogans! I mean, 'I Believe in Harvey Dent'?”

Bruce gave Harvey's hand one last very tight grip, then released it. Dent curled it into a fist.

“It worked, didn't it? I'm in office. Which is why you're here, isn't it?”

“Excuse me?”

Gordon gripped Harvey's arm. “I think we should—”

Harvey shrugged him off, stepped closer to Bruce.

“You're here to make a point of my knowing you funded my campaign,” he said. “Aren't you? Do you know how many people have revealed their anonymous generosity to me tonight? And you know, the funniest thing happens when people put _their_ money into _your_ power. You know what happens, Bruce?”

Bruce watched him with interest. It was strangely refreshing to hear such honesty from a politician. He watched those dark eyes sparkle with bitterness, and pondered the man.

“What?”

“They start thinking they've bought themselves a little piece of your office,” Harvey said. He laughed, his face stormily beautiful despite the ugliness of his scorn. “Amazing how that happens, isn't it? They trust you to win, and then they trust you to use your power to further their agendas. So, why don't you just go ahead and ask me, Bruce. Go on. Ask me to go easy on your corporation, or to attack your competition, maybe? Ask me to get a friend off of charges. Ask me to sweep your least favorite demographic under the rug, to clean up an area you want to gentrify. What is it you want your donation to have bought you, Bruce? Hm?”

“Harvey!” Gordon snapped sternly.

Bruce Wayne was delighted with the contentious District Attorney. He had not seen such earnest virtue in a very long time, had thought it all but extinct in Gotham City. It was refreshing to meet someone besides himself and Gordon that actually believed in the fight for the city's soul. He only wished Harvey knew of his own intentions, instead of lumping him in with the rest of the upper crust.

“No, Commissioner, don't stop him,” Bruce said, not taking his eyes off of Harvey. “I want to hear this, Dent. What if I did expect a favor, as you insinuate your other donors do?”

“If you expect a favor—” Harvey glanced at Gordon. He was a little uncertain, thrown off by Wayne's lack of offense. He slid his hands into his pockets, looking up at the taller man coolly. “Well, I'm not granting any. I thank you for your support, but the office of District Attorney is no longer for sale.”

“I give up,” sighed Gordon. He threw his cigarette to the floor and crushed it under his shoe. “Damn it, Harvey, you're on your own.”

He left the two men staring at each other.

“That's a new and novel approach to political office in Gotham,” Bruce remarked.

“It is, isn't it?” Harvey looked after Gordon. “Look, I'd better go before dad decides to spank me.”

“He certainly was dedicated to getting you elected,” Bruce said, watching Gordon. “Do you think you deserve it?”

“The office or the spanking?” Harvey grunted in amusement. “What do you think?”

“Probably both.”

Harvey glanced at him sharply. Bruce cursed himself for the comment; it had come out much more flirtatious than he had intended. He cleared his throat, not meeting Harvey's eyes. Two years back in Gotham, and he had spent them alone. His life was complicated enough without romance.

“Anyway, I appreciate your honesty, Mr. Dent,” Bruce said, walking to the ledge of the balcony and looking out at Gotham. A large stone gargoyle leered down at it beside him. “It's rare to meet anyone in Gotham that isn't afraid: afraid of stepping on the wrong toes, or afraid of being honest, afraid of doing the right thing. Everywhere you look in Gotham, everyone is so afraid.”

Harvey came over beside him.

“Not without reason,” he said softly, thinking of Gilda. “There are real nightmares out there in Gotham City.”

“I would never blame anyone for their fear,” Bruce said. “I only think the city does need more people that refuse to let themselves be scared. More people like you.”

Harvey waved a hand.

“One ill-tempered speech and you're impressed? If only all the voters had been that easy.” He drew in the cold winter air, hands shoved in his pockets again. “I meant every word I said, but I will apologize for the attitude. Justice should be blind. I don't usually judge anyone on sight. It's just been a long night … ”

Bruce turned to him and stared at the man. He opened his mouth to assure Harvey that he had taken no offense, but then he saw it: a thin red laser line shining from the building across the street. Bruce followed the sight line into the ballroom, and saw it rest upon Jim Gordon's chest.

Bruce reacted in the split seconds before the shot went off. He threw Harvey to the floor of the balcony, crouched, and dashed into the ballroom.

“JIM, GET DOWN!”

The bullet whizzed into the crowd, but due to the confusion, missed Gordon. Bruce reached him in three bowed strides, and pulled him to the floor. There was a moment of stunned confusion, and then the screams started. The laser searched the crowd for Gordon, but Bruce had dragged him to the cover of the wall. There was not a second shot. _This is a professional hit,_ Bruce thought. _Sniper._

“We have to get you out of here,” Bruce told Gordon. “This—”

The wall exploded, and Gordon was thrown to the floor. Blood sprayed everywhere. Bruce's blue eyes went wide with shock. The sniper had shot _through_ the wall, using one of the newest miniature missile launchers just coming into the military. Bruce grabbed Gordon and pulled him towards the exit. Harvey joined them, helping Bruce with the wounded Commissioner's weight.

“What the hell is this?” Harvey asked, more angry than afraid. “Jesus God! Is Jim hurt? Is he shot?”

“Yes,” Bruce said, his hand pressed hard to the wound in Gordon's shoulder. “Call an ambulance. Call it in to Gotham PD.”

Harvey was already on his phone.

“Goddamn bastard,” Gordon cursed, wincing in pain. “Arrgh. You were right, Harvey. We have better things to do than dance the night away at some party. No offense, Bruce.”

“Believe me, this isn't the Wayne Foundation's idea of how to honor the police force,” Bruce said dryly. “Harvey, here. Apply pressure right—Yes, just there, press hard. Take him to the back exit of the Regal's first floor, and do not exit the building until the ambulance has pulled up to the door.”

“What?” Harvey asked. “Why? Where are you going?”

“I … brought a guest,” Bruce lied. “I have to go back up and make sure she's safe.”

“Oh. Uh, shouldn't you have done that first?”

“My guest wasn't the target, and this isn't a random shooting,” Bruce said. “I had to make sure Gordon was safe. That's your job now. Do you understand, Harvey?”

“Sure, sure. I got him.”

Bruce sent them down in one of the elevators, and then used his keycard on the second elevator to access the Wayne Suite: an entire floor his family had owned since the Gotham Regal was built. He had certainly brought a guest, and it was time for his personal companion to make an appearance.

Behind the bar there was a secret chamber, which Bruce accessed through a biometric lock. The steel chamber had the appearance of a bank vault, and was far more secure. Bright white lights snapped on. Bruce undressed, and then suited up in a very different costume than the tuxedo.

Not much time later, Batman stood on the balcony where Bruce Wayne had met Harvey Dent just minutes ago. He superimposed the laser line of sight on his vision through his mask's equipment, tracing it across the city. A three-dimensional map of the city showed him the building where the shot had come from, tracing it straight to the room. Batman shot his grappling hook to the nearest building, and swung his way towards the sniper's nest.

It was a business tower being renovated, the top floors empty. The building was three hundred yards from the Gotham Regal. Not only was the assassin a sniper, he or she was a damn good shot. Batman used thermal imaging to search the building, but the top floors were empty. Impossible to tell if the shooter was still in the building or had fled into the crowd. Impossible to identify them.

The shooter had been smart and taken whatever shell casings they had used. They had not left a single hair or fiber. The empty, half-finished room was devoid of any trace of the sniper. They had come and gone like a very precise ghost.

* * *

Bruce Wayne met Gordon's wife, Barbara, at the hospital. Her eyes were red and puffy from crying. She held their infant son, James, Jr., cradled to her chest. Jim had been shot though the shoulder, but the high-tech round had exploded into the wall while the actual bullet had been the only thing to penetrate Gordon's flesh. The bullet had been removed without much effort, though Gordon had lost a lot of blood. He was stable by now, and would probably be fine. Regardless, Barbara was scared as hell. Bruce reassured her as best as he could.

“Hell of a thing,” Harvey Dent said darkly, suddenly at Bruce's side. “Hey, was your guest all right?”

“Hm? Oh, yeah, she's fine,” Bruce said, recalling his previous lie. “I sent her home. Are you okay? Shouldn't you call your wife?”

“Gilda? Oh, yeah, I will,” Harvey said distractedly. He was pacing, hand against his mouth, a deep frown on his face. “Hell of a damn thing.”

“Harvey.” Bruce took him by both shoulders to hold him still. “ _Are you_ okay?”

“I'm pissed is what I am,” Harvey said. “We have our differences, but Jim Gordon is a friend-- a _good_ friend. More importantly, he's one of the last clean cops in the city. He's good police, good people. Which means, _Mr. Wayne_ , that anyone in this goddamned city could have targeted him.”

“Still, it was a pretty bold attempt, and an expensive endeavor,” Bruce reasoned. “Did you two have any new cases involving the major players? Falcone? Maroni? Or anyone with military experience or connections?”

“What's it to you?” Harvey asked. “You're not a cop. Just go home to your mansion.”

“Gordon is my friend, too, Harvey,” Bruce said sternly. Harvey's scorn of his wealth was no longer novel or cute; he would not allow any more baseless disrespect. “Listen, when my parents were murdered when I was a child, Jim Gordon was the only cop in the city that offered me any sympathy, any comfort. I may not be the law, but I am just as invested in Gordon's survival as you are.”

The temper glinted in Harvey's eyes momentarily, but then it faded. He shook his head.

“I'm sorry,” he said. “I hadn't thought about your parents. Hell of a thing. I didn't mean to … Sorry.”

Looking down at him in the bright white hospital fluorescent lights, Bruce realized that Harvey's eyes were actually inky blue, the color of an evening sky before a storm. He looked tired, like the harrowed hero of some crime film. Bruce could not help it, he reached out and put a hand on the man's shoulder. There was a slight twitch, as if Harvey would pull away instinctively, but then Bruce felt his muscles relax under the grip.

“Jesus, you must think I'm a bastard,” Harvey said quietly. “You funded my campaign, and all I've done is bitch at you all night. You know, I always wondered why the men and women in office say such stupid things, make such stupid mistakes. I never thought that whatever their power, they stayed human. Hardest thing in the world … being human. Huh. Guess I'm just another two-faced politician.”

“You're not. You seem like a good guy, Harvey.”

Harvey blinked. He did not seem very used to being complimented by Bruce's type, and a faint flush lit his cheeks. It took every ounce of restraint for Bruce not to kiss him.

“Uh, thanks, Bruce,” Harvey said awkwardly. “I appreciate it. I really do. It's … It's just been Gordon and I, working nonstop, going through this crucible no one understands. I guess you've been through your own, though, haven't you? When you were a kid?”

Harvey sat on one of the waiting chairs, and Bruce sat in the one beside his.

“I watched my parents get gunned down in cold blood, right there in the middle of Crime Alley,” Bruce said quietly. Since returning to Gotham two years ago, he had not spoken of the murder. It still tightened his throat to speak of it. “The press loved it. The police couldn't care less about an orphaned billionaire. Gordon promised me justice. He … made as much sense of a senseless tragedy as anyone could. He was a friend to me then. He's a friend to me now. I continued funding the Ball in Blue to celebrate that friendship. I supported your campaign based solely on trusting Jim's opinion. I wish I could do the jobs you and Jim do, but I'm not that person. Still, I will do whatever I can to help Jim, and to help you.”

“Yeah?” Harvey smiled sheepishly. “Can you start with a ride? I went to the Ball in Blue with Jim … ”

“Sure, I'll call my driver around,” Bruce said. “You going home?”

“No, I got to get to the Gotham PD,” Harvey said, standing. He snorted in amusement. “Call your driver around, huh? How about that?”

Bruce ignored the comment. Harvey's disdain for the one percent was not a trait that would be defeated easily, he suspected. He couldn't really blame Harvey for that, as he shared his dislike for many of the people in his own tax bracket.

Case in point: the excitable young man who had broken away from the crowd of Ball-goers and was currently making his way to Bruce like a shark to blood. Boyishly handsome, impeccably groomed, normally at least half-drunk on expensive scotch, and perpetually useless, Robert 'Bobby' Halloran was the portrait of a male socialite. Bruce had once considered taking him as a lover. Every time he crossed paths with him, Bruce was grateful that he had never given in to that temptation. They had been friends before Bruce left Gotham, but Bruce really couldn't see much worth in him now.

“Oh my God, Bruce!” Bobby exclaimed, coming right up to the much taller man and putting a hand on his shoulder. “I heard you were _out there_ when the shots went off! They said you actually pulled the Commish to _safety_! That you … That you staunched the bleeding with your bare hand. Are you kidding me?”

“I did,” Bruce said. He stifled the urge to laugh at the disgusted scowl Harvey had turned on Halloran. “It was adrenaline. What can I say? Look, Bobby—”

“It was horrible. Who would do something like that? What the hell is wrong with people?” Bobby asked shrilly, his panic likely fueled by cocaine. “I can't believe it. This world is sick. It's just … It's sick! Killer clowns, men in bat costumes, and now assassins? It was just a party! Just a damn party! They can't just … just _shoot up_ parties!”

“Pretty sure they can, kid,” Harvey interjected.

Bobby turned his attention to him then, his large brown eyes wide.

“What? You're the damn District Attorney!” he said accusingly. “You're not supposed to let this stuff just happen! I _voted_ for you! People believed in you!”

“Unfortunately, being the DA doesn't give me psychic powers,” Harvey said, very dry. “The police will find this animal, though, and I **will** see them rot in prison. You can believe in _that_.”

“Yeah, okay,” Bobby said, a bit timid beneath Harvey's hard stare. He turned back to Bruce. “Look, have you seen my date? We were supposed to meet at the Ball but I only saw him for a few minutes before it started.”

“I'll meet you outside, Bruce,” Harvey said. He hurried away from Bobby and the rest of the crowd that had followed Gordon to the hospital to get their scrapes and nerves tended to.

“Who was your date?” Bruce asked, eager to tell Bobby that he had not seen them and be off. Bobby was chewing on his thumbnail, a habit he had been unable to defeat since childhood. Bruce felt a streak of pity, and put a hand on his shoulder. “Hey, Bobby, relax. It's okay. You're safe now. I'm sure your date is fine. What's his name? Him? Or her?”

“He's a guy, we met when I was with my dad in Washington, D.C.,” Bobby rambled. “Not my usual type, I mean … He's different, you know? But he's really very—” He noticed Bruce's impatience and cleared his throat. “His name is Floyd Lawton. I think he was military or something.”

The name hit Bruce like a slap in the face. He was suddenly taken back six years, to summer days spent in the Middle East. He could almost smell sand and blood and fear in the hot desert air, hear the crackle of gunfire in his ears. The image of a dashing dark-haired man flashed through his mind, face tanned and scratchy with stubble, a rifle rested neatly on his shoulder. He remembered the upward tilt of his face, and the flash of white teeth in a savage, wolfish smile.

“Bobby.” Bruce licked his lips, preparing his words carefully. “How long has Floyd Lawton been in Gotham?”

“You know him?” Bobby asked. He was foolish, but not entirely stupid. “You look like you know him.”

“Just tell me, Bobby.”

Bobby flinched at the snap of his tone. Raised by a severe, cold father, he had always been sensitive to older men that treated him sternly. Bruce felt slightly guilty for using this trait against him, but he needed answers fast.

“Floyd flew in with me and dad, two weeks ago,” Bobby said. He realized the psychology Bruce had used to get the answer from him, and flushed with humiliated anger. “Why do you care? You don't think he had something to do with this, do you? Floyd's pretty hard, but he's not, you know, some assassin!”

“Of course not, Bobby,” Bruce said gently, forcing a smile. He put an arm around the younger man's shoulders and led him to the nurse's station. “You look dehydrated. Miss? This is Bobby Halloran. He could use fluids. Can you get someone? …. Thanks.”

Leaving a stammering and confused Bobby at the station, Bruce hurried away. Floyd Lawton. He met Harvey outside and drove him to the GCPD station, but his mind was miles and years away.

* * *

[June 13, 2008, Afghanistan]

“ _I want to learn how to shoot.”_

_Major General Walter Halloran looked up from the papers he had been rifling through, his navy blue eyes boring into Bruce's lighter ones. He squinted them, the permanent wrinkles at their corners deepening. His stern face was stoic as ever, but Bruce knew exactly what he was thinking: that it was impossible, ridiculous, that Bruce Wayne, who had once played on yachts with his own son Bobby, would want to be trained to shoot by the most elite squad the US Marines Corps had to offer. The suggestion was so ludicrous that it was an affront. Bruce decided to speak before Major General Halloran had time to contemplate just how insulting the suggestion was._

“ _You know what happened to my parents when I was a kid,” Bruce said, hating himself for playing that card but knowing he had no choice. “Everyone assumes that I left Gotham to avoid those memories, and I did, but I don't plan to run forever. When I go back, well … I want to do so with the skills to defend myself. I don't want to have to be afraid of my home anymore, sir.”_

_The temper that had been rising in Major General Halloran's eyes faded. With the sympathy softening his face slightly, Bruce realized that he looked somewhat like his son Bobby in his boyish handsomeness, but the resemblance was obscured by age, attitude, and cunning. It was no wonder that he viewed his only child as a hopeless failure._

“ _I can understand that, son, and I commend you for wanting to face your fears,” Halloran told him. He stood, looking Bruce up and down. “I won't say you haven't changed from the last time I saw you. There's a grit to you now, steel in your eyes. You probably know better than anyone that guns aren't playthings.”_

“ _Yes, sir.”_

“ _But the kind of shooting my men do … is not for self-defense,” Halloran said. “I won't turn a practical young man into a weapon, Bruce.”_

“ _I will never own a gun, sir,” Bruce said. “I don't intend to. I refuse to. I … I do need to understand them, however. I need to confront them. I need to confront myself. The only way I can do that is from the other side of the barrel.”_

_Major General Halloran looked at Bruce long and hard. Bruce met his gaze evenly. Halloran eventually shook his head, walking past Bruce to the window. He stared out at the blazing sun._

“ _My kingdom for a son like you, Bruce,” he said reflectively. “Boys grow up cradled to the bosom of their mothers. Boyhood is careless and stupid, brash and brainless. Then the world turns one day, and boyhood ends. There are small signs, but one never can tell what kind of man a boy will grow into. A father that is happy with himself is the hardest to please, because he will always hope his son will be at least his equal, at best his superior. He hopes to take as much pride in his son's life as he does in his own, so that in turn his son will be able to have pride in himself.”_

_Halloran turned from the window to face Bruce._

“ _Your father … would have been proud, Bruce.”_

_Bruce was surprised and unexpectedly touched by the sentiment._

“ _Major General … Thank you, sir. That means a lot.”_

“ _Heh. You won't be thanking me when you meet the man to train you,” Halloran said grimly. “He's young, about your age, but he's … difficult. He's going to hate the hell out of giving shooting lessons to a guy like you.”_

“ _I've been around hard men before,” Bruce said. “I think I can handle him.”_

“ _That would be something,” Halloran said as he led Bruce out of his office. “If you manage to handle Floyd Lawton, you'll have to tell me your secret, because I sure as hell haven't managed it yet.”_

_They left the small building that was serving as an operations office, and walked through the town. They got into an All Terrain Vehicle (ATV) and were driven out into the desert. A squad of men were out training at a camp. Most of the men were gathered around a man holding a rifle. Bruce could only see him from the back, but it made for quite the view: the soldier was shirtless, his tee tied around his waist, and his uniform pants hung very low beneath a long, tightly-muscled back._

_Bruce and Halloran got out of the vehicle. As they approached the group, the man in the center of the group took the rifle up in both hands. Some of the men were taking video with their phones. The man turned, sighting on something in the distance. Bruce saw him in profile: sharp straight nose, scruffy face, his skin deeply tanned by the desert sun, and a grin that promised both cruelty and playfulness. The rifle went off with a crack. The men cheered and laughed._

“ _LAWTON!” Major General Halloran snapped, his voice cracking on the air with the same whip-like sound as the gunshot. He hurried his pace. “DON'T YOU THINK WE HAVE ENOUGH HEAT COMING DOWN FROM THE HOMELAND WITHOUT YOU STUPID SHITHEADS POSTING STUPID SHIT VIDEOS OF SHOOTING RABBITS ON YOUTUBE? YOU THINK I WANT THE PETA AND EVERY OTHER SOFT-ASSED ACTIVIST COMING DOWN ON MY SQUAD FOR THIS DUMB SHIT, YOU DUMB SHIT?”_

_Floyd Lawton faced his commanding officer with no trace of abashment in his cocky smile._

“ _Well, SIR, it wasn't a rabbit, SIR!” he boomed. “It was a desert hedgehog, SIR!”_

_The Major General turned an unhealthy shade of red._

“ _ARE YOU SMARTMOUTHING ME, YOU STUPID SON-OF-A-BITCH?”_

“ _Not at all, SIR!”_

_Halloran sentenced all the men to athletic punishment, and they took off to do laps. Floyd went to join them, but Halloran grabbed him by the shoulder and pulled him around._

“ _Not you, Lawton,” he said. “I've got a special kind of hell for you today. Put your damn shirt on! And how did your goddamn hair get so goddamn long? Cut it!”_

_Floyd untied the tee from his waist and slung it over himself. Reaching up through the sleeves caused his pants to fall dangerously low on his hips. Bruce did everything in his power to do no more than glimpse at the flat, hard planes of his lower body. He had left Gotham with his sexuality securely closeted, and he did not think this was the most appropriate place to expose it._

_Floyd noticed Bruce for the first time. Major General Halloran explained what he wanted Floyd to do with him, taking a perverse glee in watching the horror dawn on Lawton's face._

“ _Permission to speak freely, SIR?”_

“ _Rejected!” snapped Halloran. “You have your orders, you're going to follow them. This will be your sole purpose in life for the next few weeks! DO YOU UNDERSTAND?”_

“ _With all respect, SIR!” Floyd snapped. “This is a worse waste of ammunition than shooting desert animals, SIR!”_

_Major General Halloran slapped him then. It was a flat, hard blow to the side of the face. Bruce was shocked. Floyd was furious, but not surprised._

“ _I asked you,” growled Halloran, “DO. YOU. UNDERSTAND?”_

_Bruce watched Lawton closely. He almost expected him to hit Halloran back. The tension corded his muscles tightly, and both fists were clenched so hard that the knuckles were white. Hatred blazed through every line of his sharply handsome face, pooled in the depths of his icy blue eyes._

“ _YES.” Floyd said through gritted teeth, not removing his gaze from Halloran's. “SIR.”_

“ _At ease,” Halloran said with the calmness of victory in his voice, “Lawton.”_

 _Major General Halloran stomped back to the vehicle, climbed in, and was driven off. Through the windshield, he gave Bruce a look that plainly said,_ “I warned you, now it's up to you to survive.”

_Floyd turned his attention on Bruce. They were of a height, and their eyes met easily. Bruce met his gaze, but could see his body tensing out of the corner of his eyes. He tensed, preparing himself to fight._

“ _You want to shoot?” Lawton shoved his rifle into Bruce's hands. “So shoot! Pull off a few rounds into the sand, pretty boy, play soldier. I don't give a fuck. Just leave me **out** of your bullshit.”_

_Bruce took the rifle, examined it. Floyd turned and stormed towards the camp._

“ _I didn't come out here to play games,” Bruce called to Lawton. “And I didn't get the Major General to give you that order so that you could ignore it.”_

_Lawton waved a hand, not looking back. “Well that's just too bad, playboy! Have a nice little war game!”_

_Bruce had come to learn specialized shooting and to get real weapon-training. He also wanted to understand the mentality of a gun fanatic. He did not need to learn the basics of handling a gun, or how to shoot. He sighted through the rifle's scope, and let off a shot. A bullet whizzed past Lawton's ear, just close enough to graze it. Bruce saw a streak of blood redden the man's ear. He felt ill at drawing blood with a bullet, but he knew that there was no other way to get Lawton's attention. The rifle felt too hot in his hands, an ugly, heavy weight._

“ _ARE YOU FUCKING INSANE?” Floyd shouted as he whipped around and stormed towards Bruce. “The hell is your problem? You could have killed me, you idiot!”_

_Floyd gave Bruce's chest a hard tap. Blood was trickling down his ear to his neck. He glared at Bruce for a long minute before his wolfish grin returned._

“ _Goddamn, playboy, you've got a pair on you. Where'd you learn how to handle a rifle, Bruce Wayne? Hunting with daddy?”_

“ _My parents were gunned down in Crime Alley years ago,” Bruce said, matter-of-fact. “I hate guns. I hate war. I hate violence.”_

_Floyd crossed his arms. “So why are you here?”_

“ _Because the world put me here,” Bruce said. “Same as you. I don't have to like guns, you don't have to like me, but I have to do what I have to do, and you have your orders. Now are you going to give me what I came for, or are you going to fight to go back to shooting desert fauna?”_

_Lawton impatiently wiped blood from his ear, smearing his hands red. His hands were strong, and his fingers were long. Less roughened, they could be the elegant hands of a pianist or surgeon. Bruce tried not to think of how many lives had been severed by those lovely fingers squeezing a trigger._

“ _Well, give me my rifle, grab a gun, and let's go,” Floyd said, his grin stretching. “We'll go see what you're made of, playboy.”_

* * *

[November 20, 2014, Gotham City]

“Bruce?”

Bruce blinked and slowly came back to reality. Harvey had hung up on a phone call and was looking at him. They were in the back of Bruce's car, being driven to the Gotham Police Department by Alfred.

“You all right?” Harvey asked. “You went somewhere else there for a minute.”

Bruce considered telling Harvey about Floyd Lawton's presence in Gotham, but decided against it. He could not assume Lawton had been the sniper. He had never trusted Floyd, but he felt that he owed him more than that.

“I guess everything that's happened just fell on me,” Bruce said, rubbing his eyes. “It really _has_ been a long night.”

“I thought for a moment there that you had shared whatever that friend of yours is on,” Harvey chuckled. “That was Robert Halloran, right? Christ, he's been brought in for DUIs more times than I can count. I've thrown several books at him, but his father is a military _and_ corporate big shot and no judge will do more than slap his wrist. With a feather.”

“We grew up together,” Bruce said pointlessly. He thought a minute, then said, “He isn't a bad kid, just misguided. I didn't have many friends. Kids avoid stigma, and after my parents were killed, I had a lot of that. Bobby Halloran and Tommy Elliot were the only ones that stuck by me.”

“Bobby, Tommy, Brucey, huh?”

Bruce shot Harvey a cold look.

“You're bitching at me again.”

“Sorry,” Harvey said. He waved at the luxurious interior of the car, the small bar set into the door. “I guess I'm just a little jealous of how you rich boys roll. Roll right over the schmucks like me and get away with it, even.”

“I don't have a criminal record, Harvey.”

“Well, maybe not you or Thomas Elliot,” Harvey allowed. “But Halloran? Kid could use a few good smacks, you know?”

“I don't,” Bruce said. He studied Harvey's face curiously. “Was your father that strict?”

“Yeah. He was.” There was a hint of pain in Harvey's eyes, and he turned his face to the car window. “My father kept me straight.”

“How straight?”

Harvey grinned. His teeth were very white and the smile was lovely, but there was nothing but bitterness in it.

“Straight as the belt he cracked me with.”

It sounded more like child abuse than discipline to Bruce, but he refrained from comment. Judging by the look in Harvey's eyes, he knew the difference all too well. Harvey stared out at the passing city, as if silently searching for the justice he had never known in childhood. He shook the mood off, shifted on the car seat, and gave Bruce a halfhearted smile.

“A few hard knocks never killed anyone,” he said. “Don't let your heart bleed for me. Save it for the photo ops with the dying kids, all right?”

“I can't see anyone hosting a pity party for you, Harvey,” Bruce said. “Whatever you were, you're no one's victim now.”

“Damn right,” Harvey said intensely. He turned to the window again, half his face reflected in the glass. “ … Damn right.”

They rode the last few minutes to the Gotham PD in silence. Harvey thanked Bruce for the ride and got out of the car. Bruce watched the fiery man barge into the station, and then he was gone.

The window dividing the car rolled down. Bruce could see his butler's eyes reflected in the driver's mirror, wry and wise as always.

“Well, he was quite the character,” Alfred Pennyworth remarked. “I must say that it is nice seeing you entertain company in private for a change.”

“It isn't like that, Alfred,” Bruce said. “Harvey Dent is married. Not so happily right now, but … he's married. To a woman.”

“I'm sorry, sir.”

“So am I,” chuckled Bruce.

“Home, sir?”

“To the Cave, Alfred.”

“Yes, sir.”


	2. Reunions

[June 16, 2008, Afghanistan]

“ _Contrary to what people think, guns aren't for cowards. Long-range shooting is an art form. It can be the deciding factor in any conflict. It's pure power, and it takes immeasurable bravery and strength.”_

_Bruce's lips tightened into a grim line. Floyd pushed his shoulder back a bit from the rifle, turned his posture slightly. They were far out in the desert, away from the town and base camp. To avoid being seen training a billionaire in the fine art of shooting, Floyd had brought Bruce out here alone. They had been camped out in this emptiness for several days now._

“ _I didn't see any bravery or artistry in what happened to my parents.”_

_Bruce had been trying to restrain his hatred of firearms, but on this scalding hot morning his temper was not in check. Floyd shrugged carelessly._

“ _Cowards with weapons have been taking lives since the first club was made from a tree branch,” he said. “I looked up your Shakespearean tragedy. That guy Frost could have killed your folks with a lead pipe as easily as he did with that gun.”_

“ _It was Chill,” Bruce corrected, the name heavy on his tongue. “Joe Chill. And if you had tried to stop your brother with anything other than a gun, would he have died?”_

_Floyd's face blanched beneath his tan. He stood back from Bruce, staring at him. Bruce took the shot he had lined up, and then lowered the rifle. He turned to Lawton, ready for his reaction. Lawton seemed to have gone into a vegetative state._

“ _You checked me out,” Bruce said. “I did the same. Months ago. Your mother convinced your brother to shoot your father. You took a rifle into a tree and waited. You only wanted to shoot the gun from your brother's hand, to stop him from pulling the trigger. But the branch broke. That was all that happened: the snap of a branch. The gun went off. The bullet killed your brother. Could anything other than a gun have done that?”_

_Floyd nodded, as if to himself, his lank brown hair falling over his forehead (he still had not cut it) and casting a shadow over his eyes. He was exceptionally fast, but Bruce saw his hand move to draw before it reached the pistol. He could not stop him from drawing, so Bruce readied himself to disarm him. Lawton pointed his pistol into Bruce's midsection, but Bruce reached his arm around Lawton's, twisted it under, held the arm rigid against his own body, and used his other hand to give Lawton's hand a sharp strike. The pistol was knocked from Lawton's hand._

_Floyd had been taken by surprise, having had no clue that Bruce was trained in hand-to-hand combat. Once it registered that he was facing an equal opponent, Floyd adjusted. His leg lifted and he stepped on Bruce's foot to hold him in place, then leaned back into him, and elbowed his stomach with his free arm. Bruce grunted as Lawton twisted out from under him. He gripped his arm harder, stepped around him, and twisted his arm against the small of his back. He kicked the back of one of Lawton's knees to throw him off balance, and then forced him to his knees. He crouched over him, holding his arm to his back with one hand and squeezing his other arm around Lawton's neck. Floyd struggled, his free arm flailing. Bruce forced him low to the ground before he could take a hold on his hair or eyes._

“ _Easy, easy. It's over.”_

_Floyd cursed, but he did stop struggling. He gave a sardonic laugh._

“ _See this is why I never dance on a first date. Now you think I'm easy.”_

_Bruce flushed, and he felt his body responding to the insinuation. He wanted to move away, but could not give Lawton the chance. He prayed Lawton did not notice the effect being prostrated beneath him was causing._

_Floyd noticed. “Like it rough, don't you, playboy?”_

_Bruce released him and sat back in the sand. Lawton stayed on his knees but straightened up, rubbing his arm vigorously. His anger had been lost in sheer curiosity._

“ _Where'd you learn to fight like that, huh?” Floyd asked. “No stateside rich kid karate school teaches real moves like that.”_

“ _You're not the first person I've trained with,” Bruce said. “I meant it when I said that I wasn't going to go back to Gotham to be afraid of it. I'm not training with you to hide behind a gun, either.”_

“ _You think that's what I was doing when I was a kid?” Floyd asked, his temper flaring again. “Hiding behind a gun?”_

“ _No, I don't think that, Floyd,” Bruce said softly. “I think your mother was.”_

“ _Well, I won't argue with that.” Lawton was rubbing his shoulder again, moving his arm around in its socket uncomfortably. “How the hell did you find out everything? Those were sealed juvenile records, probably locked up in some county file room back home.”_

“ _As you keep reminding me, I'm a Wayne,” Bruce said. “And I confess that I took an interest in you. I used every resource I had to find out everything.”_

“ _Oh, I get it,” Floyd said. “I got daddy issues, big brother issues, and I'm a bad boy with a gun. I must be catnip to you, playboy.”_

“ _You don't seem surprised by my sexuality,” Bruce said. “Or offended.”_

_Floyd shrugged, winced when the motion made his shoulder spasm._

“ _I'm bisexual. I take what I can get. As for surprise, I've seen the way you look at me when you think I'm not seeing you. Hell, you were checking me out the first day we met. My vision is 20/8, doesn't get any higher than that; only time I don't see something is when I'm not looking.” He twisted his arm back to test it and hissed in pain. “Aow! Damn it!”_

“ _Let me take care of that.”_

_Floyd looked surprised, but he nodded. Bruce helped him to his feet and pushed his shirt back from his arm. Bruce had twisted his arm harder than he had intended. Floyd's shoulder would be black and blue nearly to the elbow by morning. They went into the tent they had set up, and Bruce sat Lawton on one of the folding chairs. He looked through his bag until he found a jar of balm._

“ _Take off your shirt.”_

“ _Hey now, aren't you gonna buy me a drink first?” Lawton took his shirt off and grinned over at Bruce. “You're pretty forward for a guy that's waited so long to make an opening move.”_

_Bruce pulled Lawton's arm straight, and the man growled in pain. Bruce had to admit that he was a bit satisfied to have rid Floyd's face of that obnoxiously cocky grin. He soothed his hand over it then, guilty over his momentary sadism, and massaged the abused muscle briefly. Floyd was watching him with his more-than-perfect vision, his eyes traveling every line and curve of Bruce's face. Bruce felt a flush in his cheeks that had nothing to do with the desert heat. He breathed in the smell of sweat, gunpowder, metal, and the chemicals Lawton used to keep his tools of murder in perfect working order._

“ _That stuff reeks,” Floyd complained as Bruce spread the balm over his shoulder. “Ah! Hey! It burns!”_

“ _The effect only lasts a few minutes,” Bruce explained calmly. “I got the recipe for this in China. I won't be able to make any more until I get to an import shop.”_

“ _Good,” scoffed Floyd. “Feel sorry for any other guys you feel like nearly pulling the arms off of, though.”_

“ _I didn't even dislocate it,” Bruce said, firmly rubbing the balm into Floyd's arm. “If you hadn't expected me to be a defenseless playboy, you might have put up a better fight.”_

“ _Believe me, it won't happen again,” Floyd said. “We go at it again, and you'll need a gallon more of that nasty rub, believe me.”_

“ _And all of it for you.”_

“ _Tough guy, huh?” laughed Lawton. He reached over with his good arm to punch Bruce's shoulder. “You're all right, playboy.”_

“ _So are you, for a 'bad boy with a gun',” Bruce said. He sobered, concentrating on the massage. “Did you mean that? Is that what you think you are?”_

“ _Sure.”_

_Bruce met his eyes. “I thought you were a soldier? You know how bad boys with guns end up.”_

“ _Wash out of the military, end up rogue or mercenary,” Floyd said, his eyes shining. “Hell, Bruce, I joined the Marines to learn how to shoot. It's a stepping stone, not a life plan, you should have guessed that by seeing my hair. That bother you? Me not being some kind of hero?”_

_It did. Floyd's grin hardened, grew contentious. Bruce bowed his head over the man's arm, but Floyd ducked his head down so their faces were level. Bruce paused, his hands pressed to Lawton's thick arm, their eyes locked together._

“ _Disappointed in me, huh? Starting to think I'm not good enough for you?”_

_Bruce released Lawton, wiping the remnants of the balm on his khakis._

“ _Do you want me to be disappointed in you, Floyd?” He put a hand to the man's cheek, recalling Halloran slapping it just days ago. “The way you think your brother would be?”_

“ _Let it go, Bruce,” Floyd warned. “I don't care what files you dug up, you don't know shit about me or my family.”_

_Bruce knew. He knew that Floyd had spent his troubled life seeking to replace both the abusive father he loathed and the older brother he idolized. He knew that he had found the former in the military (perhaps embodied by the stern Major General himself), and that that was the very reason Floyd would eventually turn on the military. He knew that Lawton lived in a hell of guilt, narcissism, and need. Bruce had a degree in criminal psychology, and he knew that Floyd Lawton was a prime candidate for the life of a mercenary or assassin. He knew that he should hate a man like this, but all he could feel was pity for him._

“ _Floyd, I know I'm not your brother,” Bruce said. “Do you?”_

_Lawton closed the distance between their profiles and crushed his lips into Bruce's. The kiss was rough and sloppy, much like the man giving it. Bruce reigned in the aggressive energy, holding Lawton's head still by his hair. He kissed him back hard._

“ _Would I kiss my brother like that?” Floyd grinned, breathless, his lips moist. “Stop judging me and let's just do this already.”_

_Bruce wanted to sit him down and talk sense into him. He wanted to take away his fears and feed his needs. He wanted to save him from himself. All the psychology and insight he had was useless, and he indeed felt that he was a rich, vapid fool. His chagrin did nothing to chill his desire, however. He pulled Lawton up out of his chair, slammed him down right on the sand, and let everything cerebral go straight to hell._

* * *

[November 21, 2014, Gotham City]

The holiday time was full of social events. Bruce Wayne normally avoided these functions like a plague, but this year it was useful timing. He hacked Bobby Halloran's social calendar and found the next party he would be attending. Given that the young man was practically a professional party-goer, it happened to be the night just after Jim Gordon's shooting. There was no chance that Bobby would skip this party, either: it was being hosted at his own house. Bruce had been on the Hallorans' guest list since childhood. He RSVP-ed, spent the day planning his tactics, and then suited up that evening. He was less comfortable in a tuxedo than in his more exotic suit, but he would suffer great pains for his investigation.

Bruce arrived fashionably late. He did not want his appearance at the party to raise Lawton's suspicions. Though he wore a mask as Batman, Bruce always felt more undercover when investigating without it. He was anonymous as Batman, a force dedicated solely to finding and doling out justice. Bruce Wayne had to be curious without being overt, prying answers with the delicate precision of surgery while appearing to be clueless. It was aggravating, but if Lawton turned out to be involved in any of this, he knew that any confrontation between Lawton and Batman would be a final one.

“Bruce! You actually came!” Bobby greeted him at one point. He tugged Bruce to the bar with surprising force. “You haven't gone to any of my parties since you've been back.”

“I went to the Garden Gala last March.”

“That was a charity thing,” Bobby said. “No matter how much alcohol you serve, it's never really … a party. You know?”

Bruce did not know.

“I'll take your word for it.”

“Here, have a drink.”

Bobby shoved a glass into Bruce's hand, and clinked his own glass to it. Bruce never imbibed by choice, but he was here to be inconspicuous; not drinking immediately would be as blatant as wearing an off-the-rack suit. Bruce drank from his glass. Bobby emptied his own, poured himself another.

“I missed you,” Bobby said, putting an arm around Bruce's shoulders. “You left Gotham without telling anyone. Even Tommy had no clue you were leaving. I thought you were going to go to college. That we would all go together.”

“You never went to college, Bobby.”

“Well, no, but … I might have, if you had stuck around,” Bobby said. He took a deep drink of liquor, frowning with more misery than Bruce had seen on his face since he was a child. “Tommy just ditched me when you left. He went to college and completely ignored me. I don't know why, but he acted like he forgot I even existed. Before I knew it, he was this big-deal surgeon. And you were gone. What the hell happened?”

Bruce drew a deep breath, trying to keep his patience. He hated to seek solace in drink, but he allowed himself another sip. _What happened? Tommy's father died in a car crash. My parents were murdered not long after. We waited through high school with you, sure, but we were never tethered to this life, this city, or you, after that. It isn't fair. I'm sorry it hurt you. But it's life, kid. I suppose he's never realized that. I don't know whether to envy or pity him._

“I haven't talked to Tommy in years,” Bobby said. “He's around, but he has his own doctor friends. Colleagues, I guess. He still acts like I don't exist. And you've been doing that, too, Bruce. You've been back for two years, and this is the first time you've actually talked to me.”

Bobby was the one doing the talking, but Bruce did not point this out. They had walked from the spacious dining room to the gardens out back. It was early evening and a mild day, so the French doors leading outside to the back of the manor were open. Not many guests were outside, giving the two old friends relative privacy.

Against his will, Bruce was brought back to childhood days. He had spent many lazy after-school hours in this garden: playing chess with Tommy while Bobby watched in quiet boredom, the three boys industriously doing their homework, wasting summer evenings talking about pointless plans and dreams. He could hardly believe that he had ever been that young. It was far easier to face Bruce Wayne as the memory of a person he would never be. Realizing that a part of that boy still lived on in him made Bruce feel inexplicably sad and ashamed.

“I've been busy,” Bruce lied. “Lucius Fox has been running Wayne Enterprises, but I've had to familiarize myself with its business. It's been a long time, Bobby. A lot has happened.”

“Your parents.” Bobby's hand lingered by his mouth, and it was only a matter of time before he started chewing on it. He had never mentioned the murder before. “And then Tommy's parents. I—When my parents divorced, I thought it was the end of the world. I couldn't imagine—I mean, I don't know what I would have done … Dad and me have had our problems, but I still … What I'm trying to say is, I … God, I'm just sorry. I'm sorry for everything you two have gone through. I know it's a lame thing to say, but it's true. You know that I mean it, right?”

For the first time in two years, Bruce reconsidered his aversion to dating Bobby. The kid was self-centered out of sheer ignorance, but he did mean well. He squeezed his shoulder reassuringly.

“I know, Bobby.”

Bobby was still frowning into the depths of his glass, like a medium reading tea leaves. Without looking up, he asked, “Did you see my dad in Afghanistan a few years back, Bruce?”

It was amazing how a man as clueless as Bobby Halloran had managed to hit upon the one part of Bruce's past that he was determined to hide.

Bobby's laser-whitened teeth were clamped on his manicured thumbnail.

“Dad said he ran into you. I thought it was weird. I mean, why would you be in a war zone?”

“I was just passing through, Bobby,” Bruce said. “I was seeing the world, trying to face down my fears of violence. I wanted to see the war zone. It was a … a phase.”

“You're brave,” Bobby said. “But you and Tommy always were.”

“What about you, Bobby?” Bruce asked. “Isn't there something you want to do?”

Bobby shrugged listlessly. “I don't know. I always just wanted everything to go back to the way it was. But it's not going to, is it?”

“No, it's not.”

Bobby went to drink from his glass, found it empty. He took a flask from his jacket pocket and emptied it into the glass, then drank. Bruce was beginning to see through his callous, careless facade, into the darker things that were driving the seemingly shallow man: alcoholism, self-hatred, affected apathy, fear. Bruce had spent two years back in Gotham City, and he had ignored his old friend every day. Was that the cost of being Batman? Did he have to neglect the few to save the many? Was this man any less deserving of his attention than anyone else, simply because he was financially taken care of?

Bruce remembered Gordon bleeding into his hand, the shock of the wall shattering behind them, the screams of the crowd. He took a third sip of liquor, letting the rare burn settle in his blood and stomach. He was only one man, in a city soaked in pain. Contrary to many religions, a single man could never bleed enough to spare humanity its suffering.

“You must be disappointed in me.”

Bobby's words were so similar to the words Floyd Lawton had spoken six years ago that Bruce felt a wave of deja vu. It was akin to vertigo of time, that feeling: standing high above on the perch of the present and suddenly being forced to look down at the gulfs of the past far below you.

“I'm not … ” Bruce stopped, not wanting to escape through one of the _facile_ lies so many people at this party lived through. “You're young, Bobby. You're not even thirty yet. You have time to do something with your life.”

“But _can_ I?”

Bruce squeezed the bridge of his nose. Compared to dealing with the psychological issues of the pointlessly rich, cleaning up crime as Batman seemed easy. He tried to feel sympathy, but frustration soon overtook it. He thought of the depths of suffering he had waded through in all corners of the world, all the endless pain, need, and abuse. This young man would never know the sharp pang of hunger or the desperation of unsatisfied thirst. His father was stern, but Bruce had seen students and children beaten within an inch of their life—and worse. He looked at Bobby, from his smooth, unmarked skin fair over clean, attractive bones, to his eyes darkened by long nights drinking thousand-dollar bottles of liquor and snorting drugs worth enough to feed villages for months. He looked at his old friend and could feel little more than irritated disgust.

“Why couldn't you?” Bruce asked, trying to keep most of the sharpness out of his voice. “You have every opportunity laid at your feet, you're healthy, you're young, so why the hell _couldn't_ you accomplish something?”

Bobby looked at him, eyes round with surprise. “Bruce, I—”

Fortunately, they were interrupted by a third person joining them. Bruce had a glimpse of sharp black dress boots beneath a crisp, expensive trouser hem. A familiar voice said, “Mind if I cut in?

“We're not dancing,” Bobby said distractedly. He was staring at Bruce with the expression of a puppy that has just been kicked: confused, hurt, and contemplating whether he dared to express anger.

The man stooped down, his face coming into full view. It took Bruce a moment to recognize Floyd Lawton: he had lost his desert tan, and he was immaculately clean-shaven and groomed. His sharp face was more handsome than ever, though his light blue eyes and wolfish grin held that much more cruelty.

“We could be,” Floyd said. He glanced aside, and did a double-take. “Well, I'll be damned. Bruce Wayne.”

Their eyes met, locked. Six years and thousands of miles between them, yet it felt that Bruce had just left his side yesterday. Floyd smelled of fine cologne and champagne, but Bruce could have sworn that there was a metallic undertone to his scent. It was as if he had been around guns so long that his cells had been infused with the smell of plastic, metal, and gunpowder.

Bobby watched them for a minute, then cleared his throat.

“So, uh, how do you two know each other?”

“We met overseas,” Floyd said, his eyes not leaving Bruce's. “Didn't we, Bruce?”

“I was passing through Afghanistan,” Bruce confirmed, also not looking away. “Your father introduced us.”

“Of course,” muttered Bobby. He took another drink from his glass, emptying it. He looked between the two men, and got to his feet. “Well. I'm dry. I'm going to go … take care of that.”

With Bobby Halloran gone, Floyd took the seat on the garden bench next to Bruce. Bruce drew a breath, taking a sip from his glass. Floyd leaned back on the bench, stretching his long legs out before him, and crossed his arms. Whether in fine clothes or a uniform, Lawton had an inherent sloppiness that always set him apart.

“Christ, how long has it been?” Lawton asked. He thought. “Five … Six years?”

“Six years,” Bruce said. His heartbeat had accelerated slightly. He was surprised that after so many long, brutal years, he still had a weak spot for the sniper. He would have to be careful of him. “It's been six years, Floyd.”

“Yeah, well.” Floyd dismissed the time with a shrug. “How the hell have you been, playboy?”

“Good, I've been good,” Bruce said vaguely. Years of perfecting his plan to save Gotham City through the Batman flickered through his mind. The understatement almost made him laugh. “How about you? I heard you left the Marines?”

“I left the whole damn army in the dust,” chuckled Floyd. “Ages ago. You knew I would.”

“Yeah, we both knew it.”

Floyd's eyes took on a haunted cast, and he lowered them to the snowy ground. They both knew the moment Bruce was referring to, the exact day it had become impossible for Floyd Lawton to remain a soldier.

“I'm not that kid anymore,” Floyd said seriously. He turned on the bench to Bruce, moved closer to him. “I live on my own terms now. I don't have all those regrets. I don't need … the same things I used to need.”

“So what is it that you do now?” Bruce asked, looking at him hard. “Nothing you feel you should be punished for? Sounds pretty bloodless.”

Floyd considered, running his tongue over his teeth.

“Private security.”

“That's bull,” Bruce said. He smiled to soften the remark. Floyd knew him better than anyone in Gotham did, but if he got any closer, it could be fatal for Batman. “Come on, Floyd, you're the best sniper in the country. You're telling me that you're content to stand around in a monkey suit for the sake of protecting some heiress or politician?”

“Some specialized security firms use snipers for long-distance protection,” Floyd said. “Highly specialized. Pays a fortune.”

Bruce eyed Floyd's designer suit. He wanted to believe this trite story. He wished that he could.

“I'll bet it does. You look great, Floyd.”

“Yeah, well, the kid picked it out.”

“Bobby?” Bruce asked. “Are you honestly with him? He, ah, doesn't seem like your type.”

“I go all ways, I told you that before,” Floyd said with a smirk. “The kid is annoying, but he's cute.”

“Cute? Or a way to piss off his father?”

“That was the plan,” Floyd admitted, “until I found out the Major General doesn't give a damn about his son. The General, I should say. He's moved up some ranks in the past years.”

“Why are you here, Floyd?”

“What?” Lawton asked. “What the hell are you asking me? Who died and made you the God of Gotham?”

“A sniper took a shot at Commissioner Gordon last night at the Ball in Blue,” Bruce said. _Careful,_ he warned himself. _Careful, Bruce, don't interrogate him too hard. If it comes to that, leave it to Batman._ “Jim is a friend.”

“I don't miss, Bruce.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

Floyd stood, brushing himself off needlessly. He leaned down again, hands on Bruce's shoulders. Their faces were level, and the old sparks between them stuttered back to life.

“It means,” Floyd said softly, “that I **don't miss**.”

With that, Lawton sauntered back into the house. Bruce watched him go, and tried to stifle his regret.


	3. Fallen

[July 1, 2008, Afghanistan]

“ _We should go into town today.”_

_Bruce glanced aside at Floyd Lawton. They had unzipped two sleeping rolls and spread them out over the sand. Wind blew into the roomy tent from outside, the canvas rippling and dappling them with sunlight. It was very quiet in the desert, though the air always had the rasp of blowing sand just barely audible. Floyd was lying on his back, naked, contemplating the morning. Now, he flipped over, crouching over Bruce. He gave him a smoldering kiss, the warmth of his body blazing through even the hot day. Bruce let his hands wander the man's strong body, tracing the solid lines of him, rasping his fingers through his sweat-soaked and still untrimmed hair._

“ _Major General Halloran is hearing some chatter,” Floyd said, nodding over at the laptop he used to communicate with his commanding officer. “There have been threats, sightings. I've gotta get back to post. Vacation's over, playboy.”_

_Lawton kissed Bruce again, then climbed off of him. He picked up his fatigue pants and slipped into them. Bruce also got to his feet. He stood behind Floyd, surprising him with a kiss on his neck. Floyd grinned._

“ _Why do you call me that, anyway?”_

“ _What?”_

“ _Playboy?”_

_Floyd laughed. He bent forward to reach the laptop on the foldable table that was set up in the back of the tent. Bruce took advantage of the angle offered to give the man's buttocks a squeeze. Floyd typed for a while, then picked the computer up and offered it to Bruce. Bruce lifted the screen back a bit and looked at the web page open. It was a celebrity gossip web site article proclaiming, “Billionaire Playboy BRUCE WAYNE Spotted With Mystery Brunette in Shanghai!”_

“ _Oh Christ,” Bruce groaned. He laughed ruefully. “Where the hell do these people come from? How did they even spot me? That was in a back alley bar deep in the city. I haven't even set foot stateside in years. How do they even know what I look like now?”_

“ _Well, you don't exactly fade into a crowd,” Floyd pointed out, placing his hand flat against the side of Bruce's face. “Who's the girl?”_

“ _She was the daughter of a legendary martial artist,” Bruce said. “I only went to her to try to get a meeting with him. We weren't together. I'm not bisexual.”_

“ _Just like your men, huh?” Floyd said. He took the laptop from Bruce, put it on the table, and put his arms around Bruce's shoulders. “Guys like me? Tough guys with a sad story? Daddy issues? That it?”_

“ _I didn't expect to like you,” Bruce said. “Hell, I expected to hate you. I still don't like guns. I don't like what you do. I think you're walking a fine line between heroism and psychopathy.”_

_Floyd nuzzled his face into Bruce's neck, licking him._

“ _Tell me how you really feel.”_

“But _you're sexy as hell, at least,” Bruce said, squeezing both buttock cheeks. He pulled the man closer. Sweat misted their skin, mingling with streaks of sand. “And I have always had a weakness for misguided bad boys.”_

_Bruce kissed him tenderly. Floyd tried to bring his usual aggression to it, but Bruce simply embraced him. Floyd started, but remained still. Bruce stroked the back of his head, kissing his face in small, sweet bursts._

“ _But you're going to cross that line someday, Floyd,” Bruce told him. He held Lawton's face in both hands. “You realize that, don't you?”_

“ _Everyone falls off the edge at some point, it's the risk of the game.”_

“ _It isn't a game, Floyd.”_

“ _Not this again,” sighed Lawton. He moved out of Bruce's arms, searching for a tee-shirt. “You're okay for a rich guy, Bruce. More than okay. You're tough and you obviously know how to live on the edge, too. But you have this tendency to put your ass in the saddle of the highest horse around.”_

“ _I'm not on a high horse, Floyd, and I'm not wrong,” Bruce said. “You know why you really call me 'playboy'?”_

_Floyd picked up a brown tee, smelled it, shrugged, and slipped it over his head._

“ _Why's that, playboy?”_

“ _To trivialize me,” Bruce said. “You're trying to convince yourself that my insights don't mean anything because they're coming from a Wayne. You do the same thing when we get intimate: shut down, make everything purely physical lust. There's a part of you that you refuse to share with me.”_

“ _Maybe after dinner and a movie.”_

“ _I'm serious, Lawton!” Bruce snapped. He turned Floyd to himself by the shoulders. “I'll be gone in a few days. We probably won't see each other again. I just … I want to leave you with some impression before I go. I know I didn't come here for that, but I can't help it. I love you.”_

“ _Whoa, hold on a minute,” Floyd said, trying to back away. “That's a pretty strong word to use with a guy you've only known a few weeks.”_

“ _I don't love easily or often, but I do know how it feels when I do,” Bruce said. “It's true. I do love you, Floyd.”_

_Lawton stared at him, unable to keep the shock from his face._

“ _Well … goddamn.” He laughed, scratching the back of his neck anxiously. “Goddamn, Bruce. I don't know what to tell you.”_

“ _Tell me you'll think about what I'm telling you,” Bruce said, caressing his arms. “Or let me in. Talk to me. I can always stay in Afghanistan as a civilian. We can try for something more.”_

“ _You'd do that?” Floyd asked. “Quit all of this agenda you have and stay here with me? Follow me around until—what? My tour is finished? Then what?”_

_Lawton jerked off Bruce's hands and wandered around the small tent. He sat down on his sleeping bag and opened a case. He had been working on something all the time Bruce had been here, filing and shaping and reworking gun parts into some new kind of weapon. He set to work scraping down a part now, and the sound grated through the air. Bruce stood over him, uncertain of how to reach him._

“ _We'll move to Gotham, I'll be your bodyguard,” Floyd said scornfully. “Or maybe you'll get me a job working at your company. Or just keep me at your mansion like some gigolo. Is that what you had in mind, Wayne?”_

“ _No.” Bruce sat down across from Lawton, watching him work. “Although you would probably fit in with R &D: Weapons Development. What _is _that?”_

_Floyd smiled, grateful for the change of subject. He snapped some of the prototype pieces together, then attached the small thing to a band. He wrapped the band around his wrist and snapped his arm. Bruce could see the design immediately: a wrist-mounted pistol with silencer. It was still a little rough and awkward, but Bruce could tell that if it was perfected, it would be lethal. A wave of anger and disgust rippled through him. Having even this prototype aimed at him disturbed old memories that were better left buried, if not forgotten. All of a sudden, he was a child again, staring into the end of a gun barrel aimed beneath cold, ice-blue eyes._

_Lawton caught his expression, and removed the wrist gun._

“ _It's still got a lot of kinks to work out,” he said quietly, bowing over the prototype. “As for Research and Development: Weapons, we both know that Wayne Enterprises got out of the war game a long time ago. Major General Halloran might have hope that you'll get back in—otherwise why would he go through all the trouble of making me train you?–but I don't. I see the way you look at firearms, even the way you look at me sometimes.”_

_Bruce was quiet. Devil-may-care as he was, Lawton did not miss a thing._

“ _You're here going on to me about keeping a distance, about not opening up, but what about you?” Floyd asked, scraping and filing metal again. “You say you came here to learn how to shoot, even though you never intend to take down anyone with a gun. You've been traveling the world for years, and somewhere along the line, you've learned how to fight like a master. You're_ not _a playboy. You're not even acting like any kind of an heir. You don't run your company. You've got a degree in criminal psychology. What the hell are_ you _hiding, Bruce? What's your endgame?”_

_Bruce stayed quiet for a long moment. Only the sound of the scraping metal was between them._

“ _I don't really have a plan,” Bruce finally lied. “I would like to help Gotham. I thought I might go into law enforcement, or politics. You have to understand the fear I lived in after my parents were murdered. I—I stopped living in Gotham. All I did was hide. I've never lied to you about that, Floyd. Those are my reasons. I don't have an endgame.”_

_Floyd shrugged._

“ _All right, maybe.” He glanced up at Bruce. “And maybe **not**. My point is, we all keep a private reserve. Men like us couldn't live the way we do if we didn't keep a few guards up.”_

_Bruce put a hand over Floyd's, stopping his work on the wrist gun. Floyd exhaled through his nose, tired of the conversation. Sweat trickled down his face, and he brushed it away, smearing black fluid across his cheek._

“ _I'm not asking you to let any guards down,” Bruce said. “Just listen to me.”_

“ _Do I have a choice?”_

“ _I've seen you look at your guns in the same way I do,” Bruce told him. “I've even seen you look at yourself the way you say I sometimes see you.”_

_Lawton tried to bow his head, but Bruce caught his face by the chin._

“ _Who are you, Floyd?” he asked. “Without your guns? Without murder?”_

_Floyd took Bruce's hand into both of his own, gazed into his eyes._

“ _Bruce, what I am is … I'm … a gold digger.”_

_Bruce sighed, snatching his hands away. Lawton grinned broadly, putting his arms around Bruce's shoulders and moving close._

“ _I only ever wanted your money, Wayne,” he teased, kissing him. “But I gave you a good time, right? I'll be worth the bill I send you, won't I? Ha ha ha ha!”_

“ _You realize you're proving my—mm.” Bruce was cut off by Floyd's mouth pressing into his. “If you can't take me seriously—”_

_Lawton slammed Bruce down, climbing atop him. He kissed him fiercely, hands working fast to undress him again. Bruce turned him off and straddled him, fighting to keep the voracious man in check. Floyd grinned up at him. Bruce pinned his arms to the sleeping bag-covered ground. Floyd ground up against him with a lewd smile on his face. Bruce turned him onto his stomach and held him there. Lawton only laughed._

_With him captive, Bruce realized that he really did not know what to do with him. He leaned around him to kiss him, and they became a tangle of limbs and tongues. They rolled further around, and though he hated to let it go, the conversation was lost._

* * *

_They did drive out to the town where the Corps were stationed that day, much later in the afternoon. Floyd stopped the vehicle some yards from the town, however, and got out. Bruce followed him. Lawton was fully dressed, if hardly washed, and he had his guns all strapped to his body._

“ _What is it?” Bruce asked as Floyd looked through his binoculars._

“ _Something is wrong,” Lawton replied. “It's too empty. There are usually a lot more people in the market at this hour. Shit.”_

_Floyd unshouldered his rifle and climbed onto the hood of the ATV. He lay on his stomach, watching the town through the rifle's scope now. Bruce stood next to the vehicle, heart racing, not knowing what to do, knowing he could do nothing. Memories misted through his mind again, and he felt as if he would vomit. He gripped the vehicle for support, the metal hot beneath his skin. It was suddenly hotter than before, as hot as hell._

“ _Oh fucking hell.”_

_Bruce looked up at him. “What?”_

_Floyd passed down his binoculars, and Bruce took them. He was not a soldier, and had no idea of what had so disturbed Floyd. Then, he saw it. A child walking among the marketplace, a black vest visible beneath his shirt, his hand wrapped around something._

“ _It's today,” Lawton said. “The chatter about an attack. We were exposed, and they've come. They're going to blow the command center. Today's a meeting between the brass leading several squads. They're going to take them out—and the Major General.”_

“ _Can't you—” Bruce licked his lips, swallowed. “Just shoot the trigger out of his hand? Or … something?”_

“ … _I've seen this before,” Floyd said softly. “It's a dead man's switch, taped to his hand. Once he presses that button and arms it, the bomb will go off, even if he's taken out.”_

_Bruce's body was tense with nerves as he watched the little boy walk step by step through the town. His hands felt sweaty and slick on the binoculars. He saw the boy's lips moving. He knew the all-encompassing fear the child was feeling, distinctly. He knew that that child had been put there by circumstance just as he had been placed in Crime Alley the night his parents died. The terrorists using him were all Joe Chill deep down: cowards misusing easy power to take easy victims._

_Bruce lowered the binoculars. “What are you going to do?”_

_Floyd Lawton's insides were turning over and over, his nerves were stretched taut, but his hands were still. His hands were always still. His mind laid the image of his brother, also small and dark-haired like this boy, over the child suicide bomber. He thought that he would pass out,_ wanted _to pass out, to escape the choice he had already made in the coldest parts of his mind. But he did not lose consciousness. He never did._

_The shot made Bruce jump. It rang through the desert, a flat and insignificant sound compared to what it meant. Floyd Lawton shouldered his rifle and jumped down from the ATV. His face was hard and grim, his eyes remote. Bruce raised the binoculars, but could not bear to look through them again._

“ _Did you—”_

“ _I never miss,” Floyd said. He swallowed, and now his fingers were twitching. “I never miss.”_

_By the time they drove the rest of the way to town, there was a crowd. They heard the sound of women crying, but the screams had stopped. Soldiers had their guns drawn, and were keeping the people at distance._

“ _Lawton! Thank God,” Major General Halloran greeted him. “You—”_

“ _Did he have a bomb?”_

“ _What—”_

_Floyd walked straight up to his commanding officer, so close their profiles nearly brushed._

“ _ **Did he** have a bomb?”_

“ _Yes,” Major General Halloran said. “Lawton, you're a hero. You understand that, don't you?”_

“ _Yeah, I know, I know,” Floyd said. “Throw a few medals at me when we get home, why don't you? Right now, I'll settle for a drink.”_

_Major General Halloran frowned disapprovingly, but made no move to stop Lawton. Bruce followed him into the building. Lawton strode through the halls, thumped downstairs into an underground cellar, and began going through crates. Bruce wanted to tell him something, but he had nothing to say. They had both seen the body lying dead in the street, thumb just beginning to slide up the side of the handle. They had seen the perfectly-placed bullet hole through the tiny forehead._

_Bruce was shaking. He ran into an empty corner of the cellar and vomited. Lawton watched him, his eyes still hollow and glazed. He took up an empty bag and filled it with bottles of alcohol. It was the stash reserved for officers, but no one came to stop him. Bruce realized just how valuable Lawton was to the squad._

“ _Don't do this,” Bruce said. He rinsed his mouth out with water from a sink, spit, and then did the same with liquor from one of the exposed bottles. He walked over to Lawton, took him by the shoulders. For the first time, Floyd did not struggle away or tense; he was listlessly limp in Bruce's arms. “Floyd … Please. Please, just answer me. Who are you? Without the guns and the violence?”_

_Floyd licked his lips._

“ _Truth is, I just don't know. I don't know, playboy.”_

_Lawton finished his impromptu packing. Bruce followed him back out. Lawton did not look at the dead child in the street. He did not listen to Bruce's pleas to stay. He got into the ATV and drove back out into the desert._

_Bruce turned back to the scene on the street. He met Halloran's eyes, but there was nothing to see there. He was a soldier. This was the price of war._

_Bruce Wayne shut his eyes, and was convinced that he was in Hell._

* * *

[November 21, 2014, Gotham City]

Bruce Wayne remained at the Halloran Estate's party, but he did not cross paths with Floyd Lawton again. He mingled with the rest of high society, sometimes feeling Lawton's eyes on him from across the room, sometimes only thinking that he did. He had considered Floyd's vague statement (“I don't miss”) but could not make much sense of it. The investigation was not over, and Bruce could go places that Batman would have to break into. Why waste an opportunity?

Bruce was glad to find General Walter Halloran's office empty. He had come prepared, and it took him less than ten minutes to fit a button microphone into the desk and wire a similarly small camera into a small hole he made in a wooden bookshelf.

The doorknob clicked, and Bruce threw himself onto the old but solid leather sofa. He had a fresh drink in his hand, and he quickly downed half of it. He put one leg up on the sofa and rested his arm over his eyes, feigning drunkenness. He had just settled when the General himself entered the room.

“Bobby! How many times did I tell you not to come in here!”

Bruce lifted his arm from his eyes as the lights snapped on. General Halloran looked startled.

“Oh, I'm sorry, I thought you were my son,” he apologized. He squinted through glasses he had not worn six years ago. “Is that Bruce Wayne? My God, I'd heard you were back, but … ”

Bruce had gotten to his feet, and now he shook hands with the General. Halloran's grip had not softened with age. In fact, he looked harder than ever. Bruce still disliked him.

“After that scene in Afghanistan—” Halloran cleared his throat. “Well. I suppose it was only one of your many adventures around the world. I've heard about your travels. Robert never shuts up about them.”

Bruce was taken off guard.

“He does?”

“He was tracking you with all the energy he should have been spending in school, or on his own travels.” General Halloran walked behind his desk and sat down, motioning for Bruce to have a seat in one of the chairs opposite. “Dr. Thomas Elliot apparently outgrew Robert, and they fell out. But Bobby didn't blame you, he excused you for leaving him. Said it was because of your parents.”

Bruce sat in the chair, feeling guilty for having snapped at Bobby earlier.

“It was,” he said. Recalling that Halloran admired respect and knowing it might be convenient to be close to him later, he added, “Sir.”

“Understandable, understandable,” Walter said. He seemed rather preoccupied, but his interest in Bruce was genuine. “You've been busy since you've been back: overseeing the company, your charity projects, putting money into the city. I think it's safe to say that you did what you said you would do, and came back to Gotham without fear?”

“As much as humanly possible, sir.”

“Very smart,” Halloran said. “Bruce, have you considered doing more?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean politics,” Halloran said. “Hell, I'm the last man to ever stand behind a politician without military experience, but there's something different about you, Bruce. I saw some of it six years ago, and more of it now.”

“I don't know if it's for me, sir, I prefer to maintain some privacy,” Bruce said. “I did back Harvey Dent for District Attorney, but seeing what he's going through … I just don't think it's for me.”

“Well, think about it,” Halloran said. “I've met Dent. He's a very pretty man with very pretty words. We'll see how far he can go.”

Bruce was irked at Halloran's tone. He thought of Harvey last night, so passionate and harassed, and his fist nearly curled at the thought of his entire being reduced to such scornful words.

Bruce smiled to camouflage his true feelings.

“No intention of persuading Floyd Lawton to take office? I ran into him downstairs. I hear he's left the military.”

Halloran made an unpleasant sound in his throat.

“Lawton is … not the kind of guy that inspires trust, if you know what I mean. Can you really imagine him behind a desk or at City Hall?”

“I don't know, he looks pretty good,” Bruce said. “He looks like he's been doing well. Bobby has been good for him?”

“Bobby,” Halloran scoffed. “Lawton's just using him, and you know what? I can't even care anymore.”

“You aren't worried about Bobby?” Bruce asked. Lightly, he added, “You don't think Floyd is dangerous?”

“Lawton? No, not in that way,” Halloran said. “He's a tool, he's got to be loaded, primed, aimed—and paid. Most expensive goddamn tool in the country.”

“So he's not entirely retired?”

“Did you expect him to be?” Halloran retrieved a cigarette and a flask from his desk drawer. “Come on, Bruce, you're not naïve. You know exactly what Lawton is now.”

Bruce frowned in thought. Everything lined up for Floyd to have been Gordon's shooter—except for the fact that he had missed the fatal shot. Who would hire the 'most expensive goddamn tool' in the country only to have him miss? More importantly, who would want Jim Gordon out of the way?

“What Lawton is,” Bruce mused, keeping a faint smile on his face. “Let me guess, a bad boy with a gun?”

“He used to call himself that back then, didn't he?” Halloran chuckled.

Bruce wondered what the assassin called himself now. What was his 'handle'? He wondered if Alfred had managed to delve that deeply yet, itched to use the communication unit invisibly set in his inner ear to talk to him.

“I take it that Floyd didn't leave the Marines Corps on the worst terms then, sir?”

“God, no,” Halloran said. “That boy earned himself a million dishonorable discharges, but the fact is that he was too good and too dangerous to let loose. He's slipped his leash, certainly, but we keep him close enough to utilize his talents and keep an eye on him. For as long as we can, anyway.”

Bruce assumed that 'we' meant the military brass and the politicians who ordered them. He wondered what the brass would do if Lawton ever bit their hands when they weren't feeding him, to continue Halloran's canine analogy.

Halloran snipped the end off his cigar, as if in answer to Bruce's unasked question. He filled a small shot glass that was on his desk from the flask. It smelled of expensive and strong whiskey.

“I heard what happened at the Ball in Blue,” Halloran said unexpectedly. “Hell of a thing, Bruce. I'm glad you were all right. Glad Gordon was, too.”

Bruce looked at him, trying to read him. Walter considered his whiskey, then took a drink. His face was stone and his eyes even harder: there would be no reading either. Bruce took a full look at the old General: his spine was straight as a steel rod, even here in the comfort of his own home, and he wore his tuxedo with the sharp neatness of a uniform; he drank enough, but there were no liver spots on his hands, his face was rough but had not yet taken on the worn fatigue that marks the start of the latter twilight years; at times, his hands twitched around his glass, the knuckles tightened, but he was obviously used to suppressing telltale gestures the way he suppressed his expressions.

“Goddamn thing!” Halloran said, knocking his knuckles against the desktop and scowling darkly. “This city has gone to shit, Bruce. The entire country has gone to shit. Soft fucking times forge hard fucking criminals. Tomorrow's terrorists and dictators and mob bosses are today's opportunistic punks. And what does the city do? What does our country and our heralded President of the United States do? Sit on their asses and smile for the cameras. No wonder Bobby is the way he is. Product of the fucking times.”

Bruce was beginning to get a baseline by which to read Walter Halloran now. The only emotion he was comfortable showing was anger and hatred. He felt his frustrations were justified, so they were safe to express. Bruce was beginning to see beneath the scorn and anger, however. He suspected that Halloran's apparent hatreds actually masked a deep, polar opposite: love.

Bruce breathed the scent of cigar smoke, feeling lightheaded from it and the drinks he had consumed. He knew that he had not misjudged Halloran; just because a man was capable of love did not mean he was incapable of cruelty. Bruce should have known better than to assume Halloran was a one-dimensional villain, however: those did not exist in this world, not even in the bowels of Arkham Asylum.

 _He loves his son, even though he doesn't want to,_ Bruce thought. He spoke of the changes in the world with General Halloran, careful to keep the extent of his opinions to himself. _He loves Bobby, this city, and his country. It's what drives him to war, what allows him to stand the burden of blood upon his shoulders. He sees his sins only as 'sacrifices', sacrifices for the greater good, sacrifices to protect the few things in this world that he holds precious. In that way, we're not unalike. Raised by him, not learning the price of a bullet early on, I might have been just like him … just like this._

_Still, the thought can only sicken me now._

“Terrorists, all of them,” Halloran was saying now. He was fairly intoxicated, but not senselessly drunk. “The punks, the so-called 'diplomats' our country is negotiating with, the freaks of Arkham, even the Batman. All of them, they breed on fear. Fear has brought this city and this country to its knees. We need more than that. We need another surge of anger, the anger that drove the war after September 11. Everyone bemoans the war now, in retrospect: they cower and quake at the thought that the government they pay has spilled blood. I remember the after-shock of that day, though. I know you do, too, Bruce. I remember the cries for vengeance. Huh.”

Halloran sat back in his chair, as if soothed by the memory of a country ready for war. He took a deep drag on his cigar.

“They weren't afraid to spill blood then,” he said, the words swirling and hanging on the air like the smoke they were exhaled with. “The country screamed for it. They cried for violent reparation—and they got it. No one thought twice about doing what needed to be done then.”

Bruce felt the darkness seeping into his every cell. It was the same sickness he had felt encroaching upon him six years ago in the Afghanistan desert. His body was controlled to a fault now. He would not vomit. He would not shake. His sorrow and cries were kept strictly locked away in the deepest corners of his mind and heart. None of this meant the sensations and emotions were not there. He was sliding back into Hell.

The doorknob rattled, and the door opened. Bruce turned in his chair, more to get a breath of fresh air than to see who had interrupted their grim conversation. He was not surprised to see Floyd Lawton himself. Lawton glanced down at him, equally unflappable.

“Should my ears have been burning?” he asked, glancing between the two men. His eyes settled on his former lover. “Bruce?”

“Where's Robert?” Halloran asked Lawton stiffly.

“I think he's cheating on me in one of the rooms upstairs,” Floyd said with a callow grin. “Guess he didn't like being left out of the nice little chat Bruce and I had.”

Bruce got to his feet, cleared his throat.

“I only came for Bobby's sake,” he told the soldier and ex-soldier. “I think I'll be taking my leave. General Halloran.” His eyes met Lawton's. “Floyd.”

Bruce went for the door, but Lawton stopped him, a hand on his shoulder. Bruce turned his face to Lawton's. Floyd sauntered backwards a few steps so that he was beside Bruce, his arm not leaving his shoulder.

“Sure you wanna go so soon?” he asked softly. His eyes were full of suggestion, a stormy mix of lust, challenge, and recklessness.

Bruce was tempted. He was sorely tempted, despite everything. He felt disappointed with himself for even considering lying with the man that might have nearly killed Gordon, but he could not deny his feelings. For a moment, he lingered, breathing the scent of him, searching those cold, light eyes. For just a second, he thought he saw Floyd's cynical baseness waver, and something akin to vulnerability shine through. The hardness of his sharp features melted for only that moment, and he looked young, pleading. Bruce had only seen that look once before.

Lawton sensed that Bruce had glimpsed his moment of softness, and he removed his arm from across Bruce's shoulders. The grin faltered, faded into a bland smile. He shrugged, stepped back.

“Your loss.”

* * *

[July 1, 2008, Afghanistan]

_Given that Floyd Lawton was absent, Bruce was left to give a report on what happened to Major General Halloran. Bruce was worried about Floyd and eager to go after him, but he knew Halloran would not stand to be put off. He went over the incident several times with Halloran. Each time he described the incident, it amazed Bruce how very brief the moment had been: not even five minutes from the sighting to the pull of the trigger. Less than five minutes for a child's entire future to be shot short._

_When Halloran was satisfied, Bruce left him. He showered briefly in the building, and then packed a fresh bag of supplies. It took some doing, but Bruce managed to get someone to drive him out to where he and Floyd had been camping out._

“ _Mr. Wayne, there's a storm moving in,” the soldier driving, a young Marine, told Bruce. Ahead, dark clouds were visible sweeping across the desert. “The winds can get very vicious, sir. Should I wait for you?”_

“ _No, Lawton has a vehicle.”_

“ _But … sir … ”_

“ _At ease, I'm no 'sir',” Bruce reassured the youth, who could be no more than twenty. “Lawton will drive us back in the vehicle he took. If he doesn't, well, he staked the tent pretty well. We've weathered a couple of storms in there.”_

“ _Are you sure, s—Mr. Wayne?”_

_The ATV stopped. The desert was silent save for the rasp of sand blowing lightly against the side of the canvas tent ahead and the rumble of the ATV's engine. There was no sign of Lawton, but a few new empty bottles of liquor outside the tent flap showed that he was or had been back here._

“ _Permission to—” The young soldier realized that he was not speaking to a superior officer and cut himself off. He turned to Bruce, lifted his helmet higher on his forehead. His eyes were clear blue. His young face showed the promise of hard handsomeness to come in later years, even if it was sunburned now. He was tall, and a robust weight. Obviously one of those men whose body matured before his face finished losing all its excess flesh. “Mr. Wayne, Lawton is a good soldier, and he's incredibly talented. But … well, s—Mr. Wayne, he's what you call a 'loose cannon'. I've seen times where he's almost gone straight off the rails, but never like this.”_

“ _Can you blame him?”_

“ _No, I … I can't imagine what I'd do if … ” The young man swallowed, looking very pale. “I just hope I never have to … Well, you know. Look, I'm just saying, be careful of Lawton, Mr. Wayne. You can't trust him.”_

“ _I wonder if anyone in this world can be trusted. But you don't have to worry about me—er?”_

“ _Private First Class Owen Mercer,” the youth introduced himself, with a salute. His helmet slipped a bit when his hand brushed it, and he impatiently removed it. “It isn't protocol, but goddamn it's hot.”_

“ _I won't tell if you don't,” Bruce smiled. He shook the young man's hand firmly. “Good to meet you, PFC Mercer.”_

“ _You too, Mr. Wayne,” Owen said. He rubbed a hand through his sweaty red hair. “And—good luck.”_

“ _Thanks,” Bruce said, opening the ATV's passenger door. “I have a feeling I'll need it.”_

_Bruce climbed out of the vehicle, his boots sinking noiselessly into the sand. He slammed the door, stepped back, and watched Owen Mercer drive away. He felt a sense of disconnection when the vehicle was in the distance, and turned to face the tent._

_Lawton had to have heard the vehicle. He had not come out. Bruce hesitated, wary of the man. He approached the tent slowly. He had told Mercer to stop a mile out. As he neared, he heard music playing loudly, and he was relieved. Perhaps Lawton hadn't heard the ATV, after all._

_Bruce called out to Lawton at the tent flap, but he received no response. A gunshot rang out, and he jumped, dropping to a defensive crouch instinctively. A second shot—_

_No, Bruce realized, they were not gunshots. The sound was less sharp, flatter. Bruce opened the flap of the tent and ducked beneath it. He stood up inside the tent, and faced a sight that would haunt him for years afterwards._

_Floyd Lawton was on his knees in the center of the tent's floor, his back to Bruce. He knelt utterly still, stripped to the waist, surrounded by liquor bottles, many of them empty. The air was thick with cigarette smoke and alcohol fumes. The air resonated with loud, angry music that had a cryptic guitar chord running throughout. Bruce did not notice any of these things, his eyes were stuck on Lawton._

_Lawton's back had stripes of angry red welts cut diagonally across the shoulders. The smooth skin Bruce had run his fingers across just that morning was bright with welts close to splitting open. Even as Bruce gaped in horror, Lawton swung his leather belt over his shoulder and laid a fresh red stripe across his shoulders._

_Bruce ran around him, putting his hands on Lawton's shoulders and kneeling before him. Floyd's eyes shot open and he tensed. He saw Bruce, and relaxed slightly. His face was streaked with tears mingled with sand, and very hard. The anguish written there was beyond description._

“ _God, Floyd.”_

“ _Get out, Wayne,” Lawton managed. His voice was raspy, harsher than Bruce had ever heard it. He pushed Bruce off. “Leave me alone.”_

_Bruce stood and turned off the music. He turned back to Lawton just in time to stop him from swinging the belt back over his shoulder again. He knelt and grabbed him by the wrist. Floyd did not struggle. All the fight seemed to have gone out of him._

“ _Don't do this,” Bruce said softly. Every sound was suddenly magnified by the abrupt absence of the loud music. “You don't need to do this. I know what you did was horrible, but you had no choice. You had to do it. You saved lives.”_

“ _That's what your mind is telling you, isn't it?” Floyd said, smirking humorlessly. He moved closer to Bruce, put his free hand on Bruce's hand where it gripped his wrist. “That's what you want to believe—what you want **me** to believe. But what does your heart say? Huh, playboy?”_

_Bruce opened his mouth, but found he had no words. Floyd's grip tightened on his hand and he pulled him closer. His forehead thumped against Bruce's lightly, as his face darted closer to Bruce's._

“ _Look at me. LOOK AT ME!” Floyd roared. Fury burned in his eyes, and there was a lick of bruise visible on each shoulder. “What do you really see? How do you really feel about me now, playboy? What do you see?”_

“ _Floyd, don't.”_

“ _WHAT DO YOU SEE?”_

_Bruce shook his head._

“ _I just see a man in pain,” he said gently. “A boy that lost his family.”_

“ _Yeah right,” scoffed Floyd. “I see it in your eyes there, playboy. You're fighting it, but I see the disgust. I see the misery. You're wondering why men like me exist. You're wondering why I let myself become this. You asked me earlier what I was without my guns, without this … violence. Honestly, Bruce, I'm nothing.”_

“ _That isn't true—”_

“ _It is true!” Floyd shouted. Fresh tears spilled down his face, but he did not notice them. “It's true. You know, I … I thought my brother was supposed to be the tool. He was the one our mother gave the 'contract' to. I tried to stop that, and I paid for it with his blood. I was the universe's patsy, Bruce. I was the one that was supposed to be the tool. The moment that shot went haywire, I was bonded to it. Bruce, there's no man behind the gun here. **I am** the gun.”_

“ _You don't need any of this,” Bruce said. “You don't deserve it—”_

“ _Say that again,” Floyd said tightly. “Look me in the eyes and tell me that I don't deserve a little pain for **murdering** a child.”_

_Bruce licked his lips._

“ _Floyd, I … I think you deserve better than this self-indulgence. Better, and worse. I understand your need to be punished. I … Yes, all right? Fine! I'll admit it!” Bruce released Floyd's hand, though he took the belt from him. He tightened his hands over it, the hot leather slick beneath his palms. “There is a part of me that wants you punished. Of course there is, that's the instinctual reaction of normal society to violence: punish the perpetrators. But what good does that do? What does it change? You say you're a tool just like your guns, but guns don't do this. They don't torture themselves over the lives they take.”_

_Floyd swallowed, turned his face._

“ _Yet you'll sit here and beat yourself and then go back to it,” Bruce said. “Give it up. That would be how I punish you: I'd make you **stop**. It would be more painful than this, but at least it would do some good.”_

“ _Might as well tell a bullet to turn its trajectory to the ground,” Floyd said wearily. He ran a hand through his damp brown hair, and wiped his face on the back of his arm. “Things will change. But I won't.”_

_Bruce saw then how Floyd's future would fall out. This was the breaking point that would turn the 'bad boy with a gun' from soldier to mercenary or worse. Floyd saw the truth dawning on Bruce, and lifted his head triumphantly._

“ _So what's left?” Lawton sniffed, scrubbed the back of his hand across the side of his nose. He looked very young but very tired. His voice was hollow. “Huh, playboy?”_

“ _I don't have an answer to that, Floyd.”_

_Floyd stared at him for a long moment. He glanced down at the belt still clutched in Bruce's hand._

“ _You do it.”_

“ _Do what?” Bruce asked, frowning at him in confusion._

_Floyd nodded at the belt. “You punish me.”_

“ _Christ, Lawton, I—”_

“ _You want to,” Floyd said certainly. “I see it in your eyes, you want to hit something, punish someone. I pulled the trigger. I took that shot. I didn't even try anything else. I didn't take a chance on that kid living to see tomorrow. I shot him. I killed him. And you know what?”_

_Bruce tried to move away, but Lawton grabbed him and stayed close in his face._

“ _I didn't want to, I hated it, I hated myself,” Floyd said. “But I didn't hesitate. Not for a minute. Once my finger was on that trigger—No. No, look at me, Bruce. Listen to me. The minute I put my finger on that trigger, that child was dead. You know what he was the minute he was in my scope? Do you know, Bruce?”_

_Bruce looked down at him, and he saw the light of mania in his eyes. There was a smile spread over his lips, and his sharp face was chiseled by cruelty. The regret and self-hatred were still there, but they did not soften the reality of the killer he was. It was a shame, Bruce thought, and a waste._

“ _He was,” Lawton smiled his wolf's smile, white teeth glistening, the scent of liquor on his breath. He whispered into Bruce's ear, “He was just another target.”_

_Bruce's fists tightened, and he noticed that he was still holding the belt. Floyd released him, walking back a few steps with his arms outspread._

“ _Do it.” Floyd waited. “No?” He crouched down and took a gun from a crate. He stood and tossed it to Bruce, leaving him no choice but to catch it. “Then shoot me. Punish me for real, and finish it. Make that change you wanted to see. End it. Make me stop.”_

_Floyd walked up to him and pulled the gun up. He pressed it into Bruce's hand and aimed it at his forehead, the tip of the barrel pressing into the thin skin there._

“ _Do it. One or the other. Choose.”_

“ _This fatalism is pointless,” Bruce said angrily. “You know I won't do either. You know that I love you. You're playing Russian Roulette with an unloaded gun.”_

“ _Is that what you are? An unloaded gun?” Floyd's grin widened. “No. No, there's more to you than that, Bruce.”_

_Lawton walked away from him, the ugly welts on his back visible when he turned. He picked something up and took something from his pockets._

“ _But you need pressure to forge you,” Lawton said. “You mentioned Russian Roulette. Games with guns. Must drive you crazy, huh, playboy? Make you think of mommy and daddy?”_

_Bruce felt a lump choke his throat, and struggled to fight it down. His temper was slow to rise, but it was nearing the surface of his control now. He knew Floyd was emotional and drunk, morbidly depressed. He knew the words hurt because he let them hurt, let his care for Lawton gut him. None of those things mattered._

_Lawton turned back around. He had a revolver in his hand, and now he spun the chamber, snapped it back into place. Bruce stepped towards him, but before he reached him, Floyd had aimed the gun at his temple._

“ _Choose, Bruce,” Lawton said. His eyes were not insane, not irrational, simply devoid of care. He was hollow. “Go on! CHOOSE!”_

_Bruce threw the gun in his hand down._

“ _I'm not going to do that! You're not a child to be beaten or a prisoner to be executed! If this tantrum makes you feel better, fine! But I'm not going to have anything to do with—”_

Click.

_The tiny sound came before Bruce even knew what it was. Lawton had pulled the revolver's trigger. Floyd laughed, the last of his nerves obviously shattered by the brush with death._

“ _Woo! How's that, playboy?” he said wildly. “Still don't want to play?”_

“ _Jesus Christ,” Bruce breathed. He rushed to Lawton, but the man took a few steps back. Bruce was afraid to touch him, lest his finger slip and he pulled off another shot. “Floyd, just calm down. I know you're upset. I am, too. I'm incredibly furious with you right now. But for God's sake, what is this going to do? Put the gun down, Floyd.”_

“ _Not until you choose,” Lawton said. The mad humor left his face, and he was mortally implacable. “You're not a soldier, playboy. You sit up on your high horse and judge everyone with a gun, anyone with blood on their hands. The hell do you know? If you can't even make a simple choice like this, then how the hell can you know anything?”_

“ _I can't hurt you.”_

“ _Yeah, you can,” Floyd said. “That isn't the problem here. You know what the problem is? That this_ _ **is**_ _a choice. There_ _ **is**_ _a part of you that's thought you should use that gun. There's a part of you that knows shooting me right now will save dozens of lives, possibly hundreds. Otherwise, you would have done something by now. But no, you're just standing there, waiting for me to make the choice for you. You want me to choose? Let's let the bullets choose, eh?”_

“ _Floyd—”_

Click.

“ _Floyd! Goddammit!”_

_Bruce rushed at Lawton with all his speed. He could have done this sooner, he realized, but his feelings for Lawton had paralyzed him. He took Lawton's arm and pointed the gun upwards. Lawton did pull the trigger a third time, and the shot cracked out through the silence of the tent. Both men looked up as grains of sand filtered down through a new hole. A smoky metal smell wafted up from the gun._

_Bruce twisted Lawton's arm painfully, releasing his grip on the weapon. He took the revolver and threw it outside the tent through the flap. When he turned back into the tent, Lawton was standing with his arms crossed. He had a pistol in one and the belt in the other._

“ _Plenty of guns and ammo here,” Lawton said. “Want to keep testing the stakes? I can play all night.”_

_Bruce rushed at him. He took him into his arms and pulled him into a vicious kiss. He kissed him so hard that he almost bruised his face, biting at his lip. As he did, he took the gun from his hand and tossed it across the tent._

_Bruce held him by the arms and looked at him. Finally, he snatched the belt from his hand. He turned Lawton around and pushed him ahead to where their sleeping bags were still layered over the sand. He threw him roughly down to the ground._

“ _Made your choice, huh?” Floyd said tonelessly. “Hope you don't live to regret it.”_

 _Bruce shoved him down onto his stomach. He had ludicrous visions of Catholic saints flogging themselves in penance, and the archaic justice systems of ages gone by. He only wanted to rub something into the bruises and soothe them. He wanted to soothe_ him _. Angry as he was with Lawton, he hated the idea of beating him. He held him down needlessly, letting his palm press the base of the man's neck, which was still unmarked. His fingers met the spiky ends of his hair, damp with sweat but smooth._

_Bruce moved back before Lawton found him hesitant. He took up the belt, and wondered if he could really do this. He searched for a clear place on Floyd's back, but there was none. He knew that if he beat him any further, he would draw blood. The thought made him ill._

“ _Just do it, Bruce,” Floyd said quietly. He scrubbed his dirty face with a hand, and rested his chin on his arms. “Just … do it.”_

“ _Is that what your father would have done? Is it what you believe your brother would do with you now? Or vice versa?”_

“ _Who gives a damn?” sighed Lawton. “You're here, they're not. I thought you made your choice, Bruce? Or are you thinking this is the wrong one?”_

“ _It's wrong … It's_ _ **all**_ _wrong, Floyd.”_

“ … _I know.”_

_Bruce stared at the man's long, lithe form sprawled out before him. It was something to behold, he had to admit, the sight of such strength willingly abject in submission. A surge of eroticism warmed Bruce's blood, and he was mortified. Did human beings always come down to sex and violence? Were they really nothing more than primitive urges glossed with the illusion of free will and the ideals of morality?_

“ _Hell with it. And to hell with you, Floyd.”_

_Lawton lifted his head. “What?”_

_Bruce took his arms quickly, before the man could use his fast reflexes. He pinned his arms behind his back and used plastic ties to keep them there. Lawton struggled, some of his former spirit returning._

“ _The hell are you doing?”_

“ _You were willing to be executed and beaten, but you can't be tied up?”_

“ _If you plan to just leave me here—”_

“ _I'm not. I'll give you what you want,” Bruce said. “But I'm not going to sicken myself doing it. No more resignation. No more bringing every issue other than the real one into this. No more pretending. You're a guilt-ridden child looking for someone to punish you. You're looking for an easy fix for your guilt, physical pain to make the wounds in your soul bearable. It won't work. It won't do anything but staunch the bleeding for a second.”_

“ _So shoot me then. Fix the problem permanently.”_

“ _Stop asking me to do something you know damn well I won't.” Bruce reached around Lawton's waist and unfastened his camouflage pants. “You want to die because you're a coward. I won't kill you because I'm not.”_

_Bruce tugged his pants down beneath his thighs, baring as-of-yet unmarked skin. His buttocks and thighs were untanned and very white, the skin not roughened by the climate and sand. Bruce ran his palm over his flank, squeezing briefly._

“ _You're going to fuck me? Don't remember giving you that as a third option.”_

“ _I'm not,” Bruce said, unable to keep the regret from his voice. He doubled the belt in his hand and took a firm grip on the end. “Not yet, at least.”_

“ _So what the hell are you playing a—Mm!”_

 _Bruce snapped the belt across Lawton's buttocks, leaving a bright red stripe where leather met skin. Bruce tried not to feel gratified, and failed. He_ was _still angry at Floyd: for his actions, unavoidable as they were; for his words, though they were empty fragments of bitterness; especially for scaring the hell out of him. The last was what Bruce was truly punishing him for._

_Bruce had rarely allowed himself to truly love anyone after losing his parents. Even when he did love someone, he always had an underlying current of fear that he would lose them to violence the way he had lost his family. Floyd had toyed with that fear, exploited it, and even mocked it. Bruce re-gripped the belt, and let himself take satisfaction in the next whack._

“ _You have to be kidding me,” Lawton said, his cynicism reduced to sullenness. He shifted, fingers futilely trying to get a hold on the plastic ties. “Should have just shot me, because I'm—” Floyd winced as the belt crossed his backside “—I'm going to kill you for this.”_

“ _What's the matter, Lawton?” Bruce asked. He struck him again. “Not enough punishment? Or too much? You know what it is?”_

_Lawton squirmed, though he let his chin fall to the sleeping bag. The punishment felt ludicrous, and yet oddly fitting. He scowled at the sandy fabric, spitting some grains out of his mouth. His arms pulled back made the welts on his back scream bloody murder, and the few stripes Bruce had laid on his buttocks were starting to burn. He was not holding back._

“ _What's bothering you is that this isn't on your terms,” Bruce said. The belt cracked down across Lawton's bottom, the edge of it licking his upper thigh. “You say you're a tool, but that isn't true. Snipers have an invariable God complex. You're highly aware that you're the shooter, the controller. What you said about the boy being a target—” Bruce struck the man particularly hard. “—_ _ **that**_ _was the truth. You divide the world into three parts: shooter, gun, target. You're the highest in that little hierarchy. You know it. You live on it. And you can take pain, you can take punishment, but it has to be on_ _ **your**_ _terms. That's why you pulled that stunt with the revolver, to gain control over me. Only it didn't work out so well for you, did it?”_

_Floyd exhaled through his nose in frustration._

“ _You're a high-handed fucking prick. I should have expected something like this.”_

“ _If I were high-handed, I would have beaten you worse than this,” Bruce said. His voice softened. “Or shot you. A high-handed man with my morals would view you as a parasite or worse. I see you as a man. I see the man behind the gun, Floyd, even if you don't. It isn't fair to call me high-handed, and you know it. ”_

“ _You're still a prick.”_

_Bruce heard a hint of hurt in the remark. He stretched out on the canvas, maneuvering Floyd onto his lap, with effort. Lawton struggled momentarily, but gave the fight up before long. He had driven out here to be punished, to find pain to assuage his guilty conscious, and he was getting it. For the first time in his life, he had found someone willing to not only punish him, but take it further. Bruce was partly therapist and partly disciplinarian. He had brought Lawton to a level of humility he had not felt since childhood. As much as his ego protested, Floyd felt he deserved this. He deserved much more than this, of course, but it would do. The pain and burning humiliation were a perverse but soothing balm._

_Lawton was listless over Bruce's lap as he beat him, and finally fell silent. The eroticism and gratification wore thin quickly, leaving Bruce coldly miserable. He mercifully cut the ties around Lawton's wrists, knowing the man would not struggle anymore. Floyd drew his arms up, rubbing his wrists, and did not move to get away. His face was turned from Bruce, but a telltale swipe at his eyes made Bruce aware that he was crying._

_He wanted to stop then, but knew it would do no good. He could not risk Lawton even considering playing with his life the way he had. Bruce proceeded to give his tormented lover a thoroughly stringent belting. His pale skin was hot and very red now, angrily welted like his upper back, and he jerked and flinched at each blow. Occasionally, a stifled cry made it to his lips when the belt bit into a particularly tender spot. Bruises overlapped one another, the purple and red seeping down to his upper thighs. The flat cracks of the belt echoed through the quiet tent, all else was silent except for the howling of the wind outside. The daylight was nearly absent due to the dark storm clouds moving in._

“ _Damn you, Floyd,” Bruce said softly. He gave the man a series of fast, hard whacks so severe that Lawton actually cried out. “Damn you.”_

“ _Aaaaoooww_ Christ _!” Lawton hollered, kicking. “Stop! STOP! Hell, that's enough, Bruce! Stop! Just … just stop.”_

“ _I thought you wanted to hurt, Floyd,” Bruce said. He was surprised by the bitter harshness in his voice, but could not stop it. He thought that he might be close to tears or hysteria himself. “Didn't you? Isn't this what you_ wanted _?”_

“ _Goddamnit,” sobbed Lawton. He stopped struggling, winced. “Please. You want me to beg? Please, all right? That's enough.”_

_Bruce pulled him up from his lap by the shoulders. Lawton's face was flushed and his eyes were puffy from crying, and his down-turned lips were no longer sardonically cruel but childishly sullen. There was something very close to fear in his eyes, the first time Bruce had ever seen it in him._

_It took Bruce a moment to realize_ why _Lawton looked frightened. He was shaking him hard enough to rattle teeth, and yelling at him. He was asking him if this was all he wanted, all he thought he was good for. He yelled about his parents, about guns, about the war. He threatened him, insulted him, and finally told him he loved him._

“ _I never asked you to love me,” Lawton said softly. He realized how meek he sounded and scowled, pushing Bruce away. “The hell are you doing falling in love with someone like me, anyway … playboy?”_

_Bruce had calmed, and he felt exhausted—exhausted and old, despite his youth. His hands shook and his mind throbbed. The loss of control had come upon him as swiftly as the desert storm raging outside. Despite his training, despite his efforts, it had taken only this confrontation with Floyd to drive him out of himself. He was badly frightened._

“ _I don't know,” he sighed. “I don't know what the hell I'm doing.”_

_He looked at Floyd. For the first time, the man was a pitiful sight: his brown hair half on end and half plastered to his face with sweat, his pants still hanging halfway off, fear and pain softening his normally icy blue eyes, his face red and mottled and streaked with sand and tears and mucus. Though as sinewy with muscle as ever, his leanness suddenly gave him a thin look. Bruce reached out and pulled Lawton over by the arm, not very gently but without undue roughness. Lawton was rigid, but Bruce embraced him to his chest and caressed him until he relaxed._

_Bruce kissed him, and as he did, he felt fresh tears slip from the man's eyes and trickle down both their faces. As is so often the paradoxical case, it was the kindness that undid Lawton. He fell into soft, body-shaking sobs, and finally let the remainder of his pride and ego go. He clung fiercely to Bruce's shirt, burying his face in it, and cried. He cried for a long time, and Bruce held him as no one had ever held him before. He did not patronize him by murmuring comfort or trying to ease his pain, he merely held Lawton as he dissolved until there was nothing left to break in him._

_When he quieted, Bruce kissed him. It was a chaste kiss on the lips, so caring that it nearly shattered Floyd again. The air had cooled with the storm, and Lawton was shivering. Bruce finished undressing him, removed his own shirt, and they burrowed into the zippered-together sleeping bags they had been sharing the past week. They did not make love, Bruce only held Lawton's naked form in his arms, caressing him until the fatigued soldier had fallen asleep. Bruce remained awake for a long time after, watching Floyd sleep, the anguish never fully leaving his young, handsome face but easing some. His eyes moved beneath the thin skin of his eyelids, and his dreams were restless. Bruce settled the man onto his chest, held him close, and finally slept._

_It was the last night they spent together. The next day, a very withdrawn and embarrassed Lawton suffered a painful drive back to the village, neither man speaking a word before arriving. He curtly told Major General Halloran that he'd done what he had been ordered to do, and requested to be sent to the neighboring camp where the rest of his squad was. Bruce did not protest. Lawton gave him one last long look, and then he left immediately. Bruce did not see him again for six years._


	4. That Was The Plan

[November 21, 2014]

After returning home from the Halloran party, Bruce fled to the dank depths of the cave he used as Batman's headquarters. He made sure that the surveillance equipment he had planted in Walter Halloran's office were working, then set them to record so that he could listen to the audio later. He was reluctant to spy on his friend's father, but he had a feeling that the General was involved with Lawton's business in town in some way. He would minimally scan the audio and review its printouts, nothing more unless something of interest came up. Bruce then set the computer to run several searches of relevance, and sat down to eat the dinner Alfred had brought down for him. During the meal, he told Alfred everything that had transpired between Floyd Lawton and himself six years ago overseas.

“Did you?” Alfred asked at the conclusion.

“Did I what?”

“Did you love him?”

Bruce had expected and dreaded the question—not because he could not answer it, but because he could.

“Yes,” he said honestly. “I did. I … I still do. I'll always care about Floyd Lawton in some way.”

“One of life's cruel ironies,” Alfred said quietly. He paused. “You are capable of stopping him, however, sir?”

“If Floyd was involved with Gordon's shooting, then yes, I'll stop him.”

“If?”

“I don't have any proof that he was the sniper.”

“His having come to Gotham only before the shooting is not proof in and of itself?” Alfred reminded Bruce. “It isn't like you to put much stock in coincidence, Master Bruce.”

“I don't, but there is the one glaring problem with Lawton being the shooter,” Bruce pointed out. “The shooter had Gordon in his sights, even through the wall somehow. The shot was not lethal. Lawton doesn't miss. How could he have missed that shot?”

“Perhaps he didn't.”

“But—”

Alfred's insinuation dawned on Bruce. It should have been obvious sooner, and he worried that he was not thinking clearly due to the emotions involved. Even as he cursed his feelings for Lawton, however, he was overwhelmed with disappointment in him. It all fit, if Alfred's train of thought was correct. Floyd Lawton could have been the shooter.

“Lawton didn't miss because he wasn't _trying_ to kill Gordon,” Bruce stated needlessly. “He even told me as much at the party, but I wasn't listening closely enough. I asked if he had anything to do with the shooting. He only said he doesn't miss. It was both a denial and a confession, he was testing me to see if I knew which one it was. That cheeky brat.”

“That is quite an understatement.”

“But Lawton's services are expensive, General Halloran practically told me as much,” Bruce said. “Who would spend all that money just to have Gordon injured?”

“Someone that wanted him temporarily out of the way, I would presume.”

“I'll have to ask Gordon what he's working on lately,” Bruce said. “As for Floyd … ”

As if on cue, the computer chimed softly. Bruce opened the classified intelligence file he had illegally accessed from the government. Lawton's picture filled the screen, cruel-lipped smirk on his dashing face, coldness in his eyes covering all trace of his inner pain: the bad boy with a gun.

'FLOYD LAWTON: CODENAME: DEADSHOT' was the caption. There was a brief description of the assassin's status and presumed loyalties (or lack thereof). More searches of the dark web that Bruce had initiated had found Deadshot's well-hidden contact information and hiring profile. Bruce spent some more time finding his off-shore bank accounts, all of these obscenely well-funded.

“Floyd's done well for himself since leaving the military,” Bruce said grimly, teeth clenched. “Damn him.”

Alfred watched Bruce with a worried frown. Bruce always had had a weakness for men that were the opposite of him: weak-willed, troubled, in need of a maturer partner to keep them in check. Even when he was younger, Bruce had a fatherly way about him that attracted the type, and he thrived on being needed. Given his current nightly occupation, Alfred had always known this sort of conflict was inevitable, and it pained him to see it come to fruition.

“Are you all right, Master Bruce?”

“No,” Bruce said ruefully. He stood, pacing. “I don't know why I'm surprised. We both knew Lawton was on track to become this assassin that he is now. I couldn't honestly expect a lover's spanking to keep him from that, could I? So why am I surprised?”

“Whatever you expected, I believe that you had _hoped_ your love would have an effect on Mr. Lawton's future,” Alfred said. “Or, in the very least, on him.”

Bruce stared at the image of Floyd Lawton for a long time, and then darkened the screen.

“If I couldn't, then Batman will,” he said. “One way or the other.”

* * *

[November 22, 2014]

Before he confronted Lawton, however, Bruce had to figure out the extent of his plan and who had hired him. He told himself that he was not stalling the confrontation, but was not entirely certain this was true.

The day after the Halloran party, Bruce headed to the hospital to see Gordon. He did not like questioning anyone as Bruce Wayne, but it was too early for Batman to make an appearance, and he had no time to waste. Harvey Dent was also visiting Gordon, but Bruce was too distracted by memories of Lawton to feel the intense charge of attraction he had the night they had met. The loss angered Bruce, and as if to spite Lawton, he let himself enjoy the beautiful angles of Dent's face when the man wasn't watching him.

Harvey had obviously been in the hospital room for a while, and had removed his coat and jacket. Bruce let his eyes wander the man's body as he inquired about Gordon's recovery and the three made small talk. He was broad-shouldered and fit, his arms particularly strong. There was a pleasantly ample curve of buttocks beneath his slacks. He had, Bruce thought, a very nice body. The attraction warmed him, though he had to tear his eyes away before Dent or Gordon noticed.

“Any leads on the shooter?” Bruce asked.

“No, other than the fact that there _aren't_ any leads,” grumbled Harvey. “The whole thing makes no damn sense. Given the distance of the shots involved and the high-end equipment used, the shooter had to be a professional, and a good one at that. It makes no sense that he or she didn't make the fatal shot. I mean, we're all happy as hell they didn't, but still.”

Harvey made a gesture of turning his hand from one side to the other. It made Bruce think of the old expression of the glass being half full or half empty; in this case, it was as if Harvey were saying it was both.

Bruce made the pretense of taking a moment to ponder this, and then broached his theory.

“Maybe they weren't trying to kill you, Jim. Is there anyone that would want you out of the way, just for a while?”

Gordon made a wry sound in his throat.

“I can think of a million people who would want me out of the way, but no one that would want it to be temporary.”

The men were quiet for a moment after this grim observation. Bruce saw Harvey's brow furrow, and knew his mind was working furiously at something. He opened his mouth, shut it, thought, and then said to Gordon, “What about the Shadid thing?”

Jim looked startled.

“What Shadid thing?” Bruce asked. “The name sounds familiar but I can't place it.”

“Kassan Shadid,” Harvey explained. “He's the terrorist warlord that negotiated asylum for his family here in the US in exchange for information and his surrender to our government. He arrives in the states in a few days, at Gotham International Airport. The GPD is responsible for securing the area.”

“But he's likely to be executed, anyway,” Gordon said. “Do you think someone wants him dead before he gives his valuable intel up?”

“That, or someone is a little too eager for vengeance,” Harvey said. He had already donned his suit jacket and was putting his coat on. “I'm going to run the idea by the PD. Hey, Bruce, you would have made a pretty decent detective.”

Bruce smiled, trying not to be too amused by the irony of the statement. Harvey nodded to him and Gordon, then left.

“You do have quite an interest in this case,” Jim remarked.

“It's hard to not be interested in something I was directly involved in.”

“You sure you're not just using your involvement as an excuse to be around Harvey?”

Bruce turned around and stared at Gordon in shock. For privacy's sake, Bruce still had not come out of the closet in Gotham City. So far as he knew, Gordon assumed what everyone else did: that he was a very straight, very callous 'playboy', to use Floyd Lawton's favorite nickname for him.

“What makes you think that I want to be around Harvey Dent?”

“Please, Bruce, I'm a cop, and I've know you for years,” Gordon chuckled. “What you are is your business, but that doesn't mean I never noticed. Besides, if I had any doubts, your thorough assessment of the man's ass just now took care of them.”

Bruce was beginning to wish that he was asexual rather than anything else.

“He's married.”

“Doesn't mean you can't look,” Jim said with a smirk. Feeling a bit sorry for Bruce's dismay and embarrassment, he said, “He is a beautiful man, Bruce. Even a straight old relic like me can admit that.”

“He is beautiful,” Bruce admitted, sinking into a chair by the entrance. It was convenient to have an excuse for hanging around the case, even one so humiliatingly juvenile as a crush. “And he's a good man. He would be easy to love.”

“Forbidden love happens to everyone, one way or the other,” Gordon said. He knew from very uncomfortable experience. “The thing is, Harvey may be easy to love, but he can be … difficult. To handle, I mean. Charming as hell when he wants to be, too.”

“What are you saying?” Bruce asked. “He's straight, isn't he? I mean, he's married.”

“It isn't safe to assume anything of Harvey Dent,” Gordon mused. “I've seen him be one thing, then turn on a dime and become something else. And he doesn't mean it, but … Well, he can be cruel in a way, especially to men of a certain background. He could hurt you.”

“I would never disrespect a marriage,” Bruce said. “Other than that, I think I can handle Harvey Dent. You won't tell him about this, will you?”

“He's not just a pretty face, Bruce,” Gordon said dryly. “He's smart. Think he hasn't noticed?”

“No, I guess he must have,” Bruce sighed. “What does he think about it?”

“He's amused that a billionaire is attracted to him,” Gordon said. “Said it's like a bad romance novel. I think he's a little flattered deep down, though. He asked me a lot about you the other day. Wanted to know about your parents, your travels. He likes you, I think. I told him you were good people.”

“I appreciate it.”

“It's just the truth,” Gordon said simply. “Keep an eye on him, though, Bruce. He can be trouble.”

“I will,” Bruce said, pondering this warning. “I've had enough trouble for one lifetime.”

“Guess it's the same all around,” Gordon said. “Whoever a person is attracted to, they never end up able to live with 'em or without 'em … ”

Bruce thought of what Gordon had omitted from the saying ('Can't live with 'em, can't with without 'em, can't shoot 'em') and his mind turned back to Lawton.

“Isn't that the truth,” he said softly.

* * *

Floyd Lawton had been staying with the Hallorans at their estate, but after seeing Bruce again, he was unable to make the pretense of giving any whisper of a damn about Bobby Halloran. Fortunately, the kid was too busy with his drinks, drugs, and friends to notice his supposed boyfriend slip out early. Lawton took his fast red luxury car into the heart of Gotham the night of the party, and checked into the Gotham Regal Hotel. The irony of staying at the place he had sent bullets into just a night ago was not lost on him.

Today, Lawton awoke in a cold sweat. He had dreamed of the night Bruce Wayne had beaten him, and the memories and ensuing nightmares had brought on a wave of emotion that he had not felt in many years. The hotel suite was deathly quiet, save for the pounding of the man's heart. He was trembling, still feeling the memory of bruises on his back, and soft lips pressed to his own. Fear and arousal and anger rippled through him.

Especially arousal.

 _Hell with this,_ Lawton thought furiously. He climbed out of bed and went to lock himself in a cold shower. The water made him inhale sharply and his breath stopped for a moment. The warm feeling of lust and the sweat of sleep were washed away in an instant. The man's fair skin rippled into goosebumps, but he gritted his teeth and let the water wash over him until he was fully awake.

Lawton left the bathroom with a towel wrapped around his waist, running a hand through his lank wet hair until it was smoothed back from his face. He ordered up room service, and took a small bottle of whiskey from the room's bar for a wake-up drink. The liquor was expensive and strong, burning down his throat like a welcome fire.

Floyd was struck by another memory of that night: the alcohol on his breath as he shared it with Bruce, the taste of whiskey eventually drowned by the salty flavor of his own tears. A flush crept into his face, and Floyd traded the whiskey for rum. The taste was less familiar, and so he downed the bottle and started another. He discarded the towel and slipped into slim black jeans, sick of suits. He glimpsed himself in the mirror before dressing. His skin was unmarked, smooth, and he was uncertain whether the sight pleased or revolted him.

 _I'm missing him,_ Lawton realized. _I don't know whether I wanted Bruce to kiss me, kill me, or hit me again, but …. I wanted **something**. All that we had, all the years that have passed, and what does he do? He ignores me. Not even a touch. He always was a cold-hearted bastard._

Room service was delivered, and Floyd sat down to an expensive but moody meal. That last night with Bruce had been one without sex, but it was the most intimate experience of Lawton's life. He had never regretted not sharing his body with Bruce that night because they had shared so much _more_ than the physical. It was impossible to describe what being held that night had been, or why he even held it so fondly in his memory. The details were horrific: he was beaten so harshly that his entire backside felt raw from the shoulders to the thighs, beaten by his own hand and by that of his lover, a punishment for the murder that had felt so much like his fratricidal first murder, and he had lain as naked and afraid and miserable as a newborn. Yet he had not been embarrassed at the time (that would come on strong and heavy later), nor entirely sorry. The punishment and the comfort had felt … right. Even as he sobbed, he had loved Bruce for it then. He had loved him for making him cry, and for allowing him to. It was the purest form of release Lawton had ever felt.

Contrary to what Bruce must have thought, Floyd had not been sulking the next morning. The bruises had hurt like hell, and he was almost too sore to drive the ATV back to the makeshift base in the village, but he had been gratified still. He had also been scared as hell. It was the very lack of regret that scared him, and how he had put so much faith and trust in Bruce. The purity and beauty of those moments shared in each other's arms during the desert storm had still been with him, etched into his skin by each aching welt, and he was overwhelmed by his feelings for Bruce.

Floyd had known that morning that if he did not get away from Bruce soon, he would be lost to him. He did not think that he deserved to be lost to Bruce. He did not think that even strong, passionate, tender Bruce Wayne could save him. Giving the situation up as hopeless and returning to his usual slow-burning despair, Floyd had left him. He did not think any baby gave up its womb with more reluctance than he had to leave behind the warm days spent with Bruce in that desert tent. If he had not forced himself numb, he might have cried all over again, alone this time with no one to hold him.

And now he was here, Bruce was here, and he wanted to go back to him. Floyd scowled darkly, stabbing at his food with added viciousness. He wanted Bruce more than he had ever wanted anything in life, and it was galling to be so distraught by a man that most likely had forgotten him entirely by now. He had felt all his walls falling down when he had asked Bruce to stay at the party, felt the pleading that had washed through him without warning. Six years, and he was still prostrated before Bruce, at his mercy. Damn him!

Floyd finished eating, willing his temper down. He washed the food down with orange juice and vodka. He had stopped drinking so much over the past six years, fearing too much alcoholism might make his precious hands too shaky to hold his aim steady, but this morning he had the dark urge to drown himself utterly. He knew it was really Bruce that he wanted to drown in, his caresses and kisses and that peculiarly intense love he offered so quickly and completely.

“Well, why not?” Floyd muttered to himself, kicking over a chair. He fetched a shirt from his suitcase and put it on. “Why the hell not?”

Didn't he still deserve love? No, rather, he had _never_ deserved love, and Bruce had given it to him regardless. So what had really changed? Couldn't he get Bruce to spend a little time with him again? He thought that he could.

Floyd tossed on a jacket, ran his fingers through his hair one more time, and glanced in the mirror. He grinned his wolfish grin. Bruce wasn't as stoic as he pretended to be. He would come around. Floyd wasn't looking for a repeat of their previous affair (God forbid) but they could have some fun.

“Why not?”

* * *

Bruce returned home after his trip to the hospital. He intended to wait until nightfall to make his rounds as Batman, and he had research to do based on the new information regarding Kassan Shadid. He was unable to get to work, however, as Alfred greeted him with a terse “You have company, sir” at the door.

In the sitting room, Bruce was not very surprised to see Floyd Lawton. The man was dressed more like the civilian clothes he had worn in Afghanistan: black jeans, nicely fitted but not tight, a dark blue shirt, long-sleeved due to the snowy weather, and a leather jacket. He had been wandering the large room, looking at the books in their shelves, hands in his jacket pockets. He turned to Bruce, and smirked. Bruce simultaneously wanted to hit him and kiss him.

“I didn't expect you to live in such a dark, empty cave, playboy,” Floyd remarked. “This place is like the bastard love child of a spartan and a Goth.”

“What do you want, Lawton?”

“It's 'Lawton' now? No more first names? We grown that far apart, _Wayne_?” Lawton asked, sauntering over to him. He stopped a few feet away, looking Bruce up and down. “That's all right. I never liked my first name much. 'Lawton' just sounds so formal, though.”

“Would you prefer 'Deadshot'?”

Floyd's grin took on a proud and defiant curve.

“You checked me out, huh?” He walked closer to Bruce, until they were scarcely an inch apart. “Guess you do still care after all.”

Bruce took him by the front of his jacket and turned him. He slammed him against the wall. Lawton's hands did not even leave the jacket's pockets. Bruce realized too late that getting a reaction was exactly what Lawton wanted, even if it was a negative one. The man was a sadomasochist: he had no fear or care of pain—in fact, he welcomed violent confrontation. Bruce cursed himself for being so easily riled.

“You're a murderer.”

Floyd shrugged.

“I was one when you met me. Does it really make so much of a difference whether I shoot for the government or the highest bidder? I'm not the same guy you met six years ago, Bruce.” He removed his hands from the pockets and put them on Bruce's arms. “I'm not a kid that thinks he needs to be punished for doing what he was born to do. I work on my own terms now. No more taking orders. No more wasting bullets for practically no compensation.”

“No more dead children in the desert?”

The words struck Lawton like a slap, though he was quick to erase the emotion from his face. His smile was significantly lessened, however. He gave a one-note, humorless laugh.

“Heh. You never were one to pull punches,” he said. He lifted his face, cold eyes meeting Bruce's. “No, Bruce, I'm not shooting baby terrorists anymore. I thought you'd be pleased.”

“It was never only about who you shot,” Bruce said. He released Floyd, before the closeness tempted him to less violent actions. “I told you to step away from it. I told you to leave all the violence behind.”

“Yeah, well, sorry to disappoint you, but let's face it, I was always gonna do that,” Lawton said listlessly. “You're not naïve, Bruce. You always knew what I'd do.”

“I _hoped_ you wouldn't,” Bruce said. He stared at Lawton for a minute, then turned his face. “Just go, Floyd. I can't give you what you came here for. I won't.”

“What? Am I not good enough for you anymore?” Floyd asked angrily, coming around in front of him. He gave Bruce's chest a confrontational tap. “I was good enough for you when I was killing kids for the government, but not when I do it for money? You're just going to climb back up on your high horse and pretend I don't exist? Pretend all the violence and all the ugliness doesn't exist? It exists! _**I**_ exist! Look at me, damn it!”

“I _can't_ look at you!” Bruce shouted at him. He took the man by the shoulders and shook him, as he had so many years ago. “You take lives for money, Floyd! You don't even bother to ask why or who!”

“I'm just a weapon!” snapped Floyd, trying and failing to pry Bruce's hands off. “If I didn't take those contracts, someone else would! Fuck does it matter who pulls the trigger?”

“IT MATTERS TO ME!” Bruce roared at him. He pinned him to the wall again, slamming him there harder this time and nearly lifting him off the floor. “Because you _are_ the one who pulls the trigger, Floyd. _You_! You're the one that takes lives as if they were worthless! You're the one that kills people's sons and daughters, their mothers and fathers! And because of _you_ so many children will grow up the way I did: alone and afraid! It's your hand that writes tragedy on a bullet! Not someone else, YOU!”

Floyd was beginning to think this impromptu visit had been a mistake. Bruce's blue eyes were dark and stormy with pain and hurt and fury. He had changed, Lawton saw too late, and there was a gravity to him now. It was dark, and very, very dangerous. Still, the risk lit Floyd's blood on fire, and he was more determined to win this battle than ever.

“You talk as if there's no violence in you,” Lawton growled, not ready to give in just yet. “Did you forget what you did to me that night?”

“You asked me to. You begged me to hurt you. You blackmailed me into it, wagering your own life.”

“Yeah, but not all men would have been able to do it,” Floyd said. “Not all men would have _wanted_ to. But I saw it in your eyes, Bruce. You were sad and furious, but you wanted to punish me. You wanted to _hurt_ me, and you did. You broke me down into something less than a man—less than a human, even. You beat me and hurt me until I was some base thing, like an animal yowling dumbly all night. You broke me, and you didn't stop. You didn't even regret it. Did you?”

Bruce looked as if he might be considering breaking the man again.

“No.”

“There's violence in you, playboy,” Floyd said. “You just aim it at different targets than me.”

“I'm not like you,” Bruce said. His grip on Lawton was looser, but he still held him firmly in place. “I understand you, but that doesn't make us alike. You're wantonly cruel, and the only thing that's changed about you in all this time is that you've lost your last shreds of self-awareness. You _do_ need to be punished, Floyd. If you don't want to be, if you don't think you should be, then you're fooling yourself. I can't even stand to look at you anymore.”

Bruce swung Lawton aside. The man stumbled, but managed to stay on his feet. He glowered over at Bruce.

“All I see when I look at you is a waste,” Bruce said wearily. He sat on the arm of a large red leather couch. “Just a terrible, terrible waste. You still break my heart and I still love you, Floyd … but I can't stand to see you.”

Floyd was very upset. He was far more upset than he had even expected to be. Given his good looks and easy, roguish charm, he was not very used to rejection. He was even less used to being rejected by someone he cared about. For all his fury at Bruce, he _did_ still care about him; in fact, he loved him more than ever.

Floyd crossed to Bruce in a handful of strides, and took his face in both hands. Bruce put his hands over Lawton's, but he was not fast enough in pushing him away. Floyd bent his face down to Bruce's, and wrapped his mouth around his in an angry, lewd, pressingly pleading kiss. Bruce resisted, keeping his mouth shut, turning his face out of it.

“Floyd, don't,” he murmured. Soft lips pressed against his cheek, then moved down to his neck. He shivered as the man's tongue darted across his skin, right over the pulse at his throat. “Stop. Stop it. I said, stop!”

Bruce threw him aside, and this time Lawton did fall. He landed on his bottom hard, legs splayed out before him, his lank hair flopping over his forehead. He was blushing fiercely, frowning deeply, and he suddenly looked very young. Bruce found the sight of him incongruously, maddeningly cute. He had to stifle the mad laughter that rose in him at the idea of the world-renowned assassin known as Deadshot being thought of as 'cute'. He was beginning to wonder about his sanity.

Floyd caught the look in Bruce's eyes, and smirked. He did not stand, but made his way on his knees to where Bruce sat on the arm of the couch. He laid his hands on Bruce's knees, edging between them. His hands wandered up his legs, and Bruce had to catch him by the hair before he bent his face down any further.

“You still want me,” Floyd said knowingly. His hands were worrying at Bruce's fly. “You still do.”

Bruce pulled his head back further. This was a mistake. It was worse than a mistake, it could mean the end of his plan to bring Lawton to justice. This man had shot his friend, and would have killed him if not for the order not to. He hated him. He hated everything he stood for, everything he was.

Bruce's grip in Lawton's hair loosened, and he felt his hands caressing his head, ruffling his hair. He thought of the tormented man begging to be killed or beaten that night in the desert. He remembered the anguish and fury in his eyes when he had confronted him about killing his brother. He saw clearly all the hopelessness and misery in Lawton's eyes, beneath the lines of arrogance and cruelty, beneath the wolf grin. He saw the man and the boy and the assassin.

 _I wish I were a surgeon like my father,_ Bruce thought oddly. _A surgeon that could cut away all the pain and evil from people. I thought that was what Batman would be, but I'm a fool. All Batman can do is cage men. He can't save them, not on a fundamental level. **I** can't save them. I can't save anyone._

Bruce stood up, pulling Floyd to his feet by the shoulders. He kissed him with such sudden violence that he felt the surprise in the other man's body, the slight tensing of his muscles. Then, Floyd wrapped his arms around Bruce's neck, and kissed him back with equal force. His mouth was very red when their faces parted, and his light eyes blazed with desire. Hands tore at clothing, ripping buttons and fabric, and the only sound in the cavernous room was the blaze of the fire and the panting of their mingling breaths.

 _How can I love him?_ Bruce wondered. _… How can I not?_

Bruce finished undressing Lawton and threw him over the arm of the sofa. Lawton laughed, propping himself back up, looking back over his shoulder. He remarked that Bruce might not be able to stand seeing him, but he sure had no problem touching him. Bruce forced him back down, giving his bottom a ringing slap. Lawton blushed, but laughed even more.

“Planning to play rough, huh, playboy?”

It was rough: a mad, frenzied joining of bodies that was more of a conquest than anything else. He hated to admit it, but the anger he felt for Lawton was intoxicating when mixed with lust. It was the same mixture of sex and violence that had enticed him when he had taken the belt to him, an impossible hope that he could love and hurt the evil out of him simultaneously. It was as gratifying as punishing criminals as Batman, only intimate and without the ugly malice that he felt when patrolling the streets.

It ended without rage or anger. Bruce kissed the small of Lawton's back when he released him. Floyd slid from the arm of the sofa he had been bent over, sitting haphazardly on the carpet. He ran a hand through his disheveled hair, as Bruce knelt before him. Bruce took his face in both hands, and pulled him into a tender kiss.

“Told you that you wanted me,” Lawton said triumphantly. “Come on, Bruce. Does it matter who I am? What I do? I'm not even going to be in town long. Can't we just have fun?”

Bruce looked at him. Lawton was carelessly leaning against the base of the couch, in that casual disarray that was so charming and natural. He was smiling, but not the hard wolfish grin, just a pleased, tired curve of his lips. Bruce wished he could keep him here in this moment forever.

Bruce kissed his lips lightly, caressing his shoulder.

“Let's get a shower.”

* * *

They did not shower. They barely made it up the long staircase and to Bruce's bedroom. The second time was sensuously languid, not so rough and hurried. The day brightened into afternoon, and the two men lingered in Bruce's huge bed.

“Maybe I should let you keep me here as a gigolo,” Floyd said, stretching beneath silk sheets. “I could get used to this.”

“I'm sure you're not lacking in funding these days.”

“I do all right,” Floyd smirked. “Not like this, though. You, that stupid kid Bobby … I never thought I'd have a thing for billionaires, but it's turning out that way, isn't it?”

“What _is_ it with you and Bobby?” Bruce asked curiously. “I mean, should I feel guilty over this? Bobby is an old friend.”

“I cut him loose already,” Floyd said callously. “I doubt that kid is aware of anything enough to be heartbroken about it. Life just rolls off of some people, you know? I can't see you two being friends. You're rich, too, but you're different. You—I don't know. You get things. You get them, and you feel them.”

“Well, I've had a very different life from Bobby,” Bruce said. “My parents died and everything fragmented. There was a rift between all of my friends and myself, even the ones that stood by me. My eyes were forced open. I had no choice but to see things clearly.”

“But you opened yourself up, too,” Lawton said. “You let yourself see and feel everything. You didn't shut down. I don't know how you did that.”

“Is that what you did? Shut down?”

“Yeah,” Floyd said. He looked uncharacteristically awkward, and was flexing his long fingers as if itching to hide behind his weapons of choice. “I blocked out everything but the hatred for my parents. I was put away, and all the time I was locked up, I hated them. Planned to kill them. By the time I got out, I was almost an adult, and they were dead.”

“How?”

Floyd laughed harshly.

“They were fighting in the car and the idiots crashed. Their hatred for each other killed them, the way it killed my brother. In the end, I was the only one that survived it. I had no hate anymore after that. I didn't have anything.”

Bruce pulled Lawton onto his chest, holding him close. Lawton shrugged off his arm, though he did not move away.

“How could you touch a gun again?” Bruce asked. “Why would you want to be surrounded by even more violence and ugliness?”

“I didn't really have much of a choice,” Lawton said. “I wasn't no billionaire. I'm not stupid, but I was never the brightest, didn't _want_ to be. All I had was my talent for shooting. So, I joined the military. You saw how that turned out.”

“But what you are now … It's horrible, Floyd,” Bruce told him. “It's dangerous. You don't have any loyalties, do you?”

“Only to my bank account,” Lawton snickered. “I'm not some half-cocked psychopath with a gun, Bruce. I'm not a 'bad boy with a gun' anymore, really. I'm a precision instrument. I don't shoot for free, ever. I'm a killer, but not a murderer.”

“You keep telling yourself that,” Bruce said wearily. “You keep telling _me_ that. Saying it doesn't make it true.”

“No? Does it bother you?” Lawton asked. He propped himself up, on his elbows over Bruce, and looked down at him intently. “Huh? You wanna spank me again, playboy?”

“It isn't a game, Floyd,” Bruce said. “And you're not a naughty child. You belong in prison.”

“Should I bring a set of handcuffs next time?”

Bruce rolled over, pushing Lawton beneath him. He kissed him heatedly, wondering if Floyd would be this cocky at Batman's mercy. He hated to think of the less kinky punishments Batman would dole out. He hated even more that he knew he was still capable of them. Love was not a commodity that Batman could afford, even if Bruce Wayne could not keep from indulging in it. To Batman, Floyd was—only a target.

“It isn't a game,” Bruce said softly, tracing the lines of his face with his fingers. “You could be seriously hurt. You could be killed.”

“If I am killed, I hoped it's a big deal,” Floyd said. “That's all I ask, Bruce.”

“Don't give me that live fast, die young crap!” snapped Bruce. “You're better than that.”

“No, Bruce, I'm not,” Floyd said simply. He turned his face, not meeting Bruce's eyes. “ … I'm not.”

Bruce fell onto his back again, beside Lawton. They stared at opposite ends of the room for a long, stormy moment. Floyd rolled onto his stomach, and looked at Bruce again. He kissed his shoulder with surprising warmth, then leaned his head there.

“You infuriate the hell out of me,” Bruce said. “You're a stubborn bastard, you know that?”

“I know,” Lawton said. “But I'm not going to change. Can we just end this endless conversation about my chosen profession?”

“Fine,” Bruce said. Dissuading Lawton from his chosen profession was a conversation Batman would have to take up with him. The thought made him miserable, and he took the emotion out on Lawton by giving his bottom another smack. “That's my last word on it.”

“You still hit hard, playboy,” Floyd chuckled, nestling his face in Bruce's neck. He kissed his neck, biting a little. “You know, I hear that Batman freak hits pretty hard, too. It's a funny coincidence, isn't it? You return to Gotham, and some tough guy in a bat suit starts cleaning up criminals?”

Bruce managed to keep his expression neutral and give a laugh. His insides had tightened, however, and his mind was racing. Not the brightest guy, but Lawton was clever.

“What are you trying to say, Floyd?” Bruce asked, feigning amusement. “I can be kinky, but all that pleather or leather or whatever the hell it is would be taking it to extreme measures, don't you think?”

“Yeah, but you're an extreme guy,” Floyd pointed out. He lifted his face to Bruce's. “There's that violence in you that I mentioned. This Bruce right here—” Floyd kissed his chest. “—I can't see brutalizing criminals. The guy that whipped me six years ago? I can see that Bruce Wayne being Batman.”

“Batman is just another criminal taking the law into his own hands,” said Bruce. “Whatever his intentions are, he thinks he's above the law. I believe in the law. I believe in the system being fixed so that it works. I would never be so arrogant as to take justice into my own hands.”

“Ha! Not arrogant!” Floyd laughed wildly. “You? On that high horse judging everybody? Maybe you're not Batman, maybe you are. But you _are_ arrogant enough to be.”

Bruce shook his head, sighing.

“I'm not Batman, Floyd.”

“Whatever you say, playboy.”

Bruce realized that he would have to take pains to convince Lawton that he was not Batman. Another chore. Another complication. He cursed himself for allowing the situation to get so out of his control.

Bruce sat up and pulled Lawton up, as well. Lawton stretched lazily.

“Listen to me, Floyd,” Bruce said seriously. “I'm _not_ Batman. If you run into him, don't test him thinking it's me. He's dangerous. He could hurt you.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“Floyd!” Bruce gave him a shake. “Just … ” He kissed him fiercely, and his expression softened. “Just be careful.”

“Don't worry about me, Bruce,” Lawton said. “I know what I'm doing.”

“That's what worries me.”

Lawton climbed out of bed, shooting Bruce a smirk, and headed for the bathroom. Bruce heard the shower running. He put on a robe and headed out of his room to use one of the other bathrooms for his own shower. He ran into Alfred in the hall.

“Oh, Alfred.” Bruce flushed. “I … Floyd, er, is still here. He's in the shower.”

“I had heard as much, sir,” Alfred said, very dry.

Bruce's blush deepened. Lawton was a wild man, and a very vocal lover.

“This doesn't change anything, Alfred.”

“Doesn't it?” Alfred paused. “ _Shouldn't_ it?”

“He has to be stopped,” Bruce said. “Things that would make a difference to me can't make a difference to Batman. Justice has to be blind.”

“I think the problem would have to do with other senses than sight, sir.”

“I'll have to deal with those senses when the time comes,” Bruce said. “I _don't_ know if I can. I never anticipated something like this happening. I never thought it was possible.”

“Trust yourself, Master Bruce,” Alfred said. “That's all you can really do. Trust yourself, and don't for a moment trust that man whose company you've just enjoyed.”

“Believe me, I don't.”

Bruce continued down the hall, and Alfred went to drop Lawton's freshly washed and dried clothing in Bruce's bedroom for him. To his annoyance, Lawton was already out of the shower when he arrived, wearing only a towel wrapped around his waist.

“Your clothing, Mr. Lawton,” Alfred said, placing them on a chair.

“Nice service, Jeeves,” Floyd said.

“I would advise against becoming accustomed to it,” Alfred said coldly. “And it's 'Pennyworth', _sir_.”

“Got a problem with me, Jeeves?” Lawton asked. He slipped his jeans on beneath the towel, then discarded it. “Not good enough for the master, huh? I was a soldier. Did you know that?”

“I did,” said Alfred. “So was I.”

“You?” Lawton asked, taking a better look at the man. “Guess they've got lower standards in Britain.”

“I was a combat medic, and I've seen my share of war,” Alfred said. “I've seen more than my share of men such as yourself, as well.”

“Yeah? And what sort of man is myself?”

“You are a coward, Mr. Lawton,” Alfred said. He held up a hand when Lawton opened his mouth to protest. “Not because you use a gun. Not because you're a sniper. You hide behind false bravado and better men than yourself, while you try to bring everyone around you down to your level. You twisted Master Bruce into the violence you wallow in, and then you were too cowardly to face it again.”

“He told you all about that, did he?” Lawton said softly. “Great. Just great. Did it get you off, old man? Is that what this is? Can't have me, so you're going to insult me?”

“I wouldn't want a thing to do with you, even if I were so inclined,” the decidedly straight butler replied dryly. “Master Bruce is the one that sees the good in you. Which is why in the end, I'm certain you'll run away from him again. Ironically, it's your very cowardice that will free Bruce of you, Mr. Lawton.”

Lawton slipped his shirt on, and looked at Alfred. Unable to argue, he said nothing.

“Your coat is hung by the door,” Alfred said pointedly on his way out, “ _sir_.”

Lawton stood staring at the door when he was gone. He looked around Bruce's bedroom, feeling the weight of the estate as if it were collapsing on him. He felt misplaced, as if he were an intruder here, and scowled. What had he expected? To feel at home in this mausoleum? To fit so rightly with Bruce that he could forget that they were worlds apart? Was that why he wanted to fit Bruce into the role of Batman? To make Bruce as much an outsider and fighter as he was?

 _That's ridiculous,_ Lawton thought. _Wayne's deeper than most of these rich assholes, but he's still some corporate billionaire. He came back to Gotham to throw his money around and pray that he can fund solutions to problems. He knows the way the world is, but he's still useless to change it. I'm kidding myself if I think we have anything in common._

“Floyd?”

Floyd looked up. He was sitting on the edge of Bruce's bed, pondering their relationship. Bruce came over and sat beside him.

“What's the matter?”

“Nothing,” Floyd lied. He grinned. “Only, I think your butler doesn't approve of me so much.”

“Alfred? He can be a little … overprotective,” Bruce explained. “He practically raised me after my parents died. He's like a third parent.”

Lawton flopped onto his back, staring at the ceiling.

“Well, your third parent said that I was a coward. He's not so worried about me ruining your life because he believes my cowardice will send me running away from you.”

“Is that what you did six years ago?” Bruce asked. “Run away from me? From being loved by me?”

Floyd was quiet for so long that Bruce did not think he would answer. Then, he said simply, “Yeah.”

“I hated letting you go.” Bruce took one of the man's hands into his own, smoothing his fingers over the knuckles. “I was tempted to go after you, but I knew it wouldn't make any difference. Is there anything that would make a difference this time?”

Lawton put an arm over his eyes. His mouth turned down sullenly. The room was very quiet, save for the ticking of a clock.

“No.”

Bruce sat stroking his hand for a while. Lawton had often fallen into these surly depressive moods after making love six years ago. Back then, he would always go out into the desert and shoot something. Floyd could cope with violence and death and anguish, but he was unable to tolerate too much affection.

“I got things to do,” Lawton said suddenly. He sat up and sprang off the bed to his feet. He sniffed, though his eyes were mostly dry. “Business to take care of.”

Bruce also stood, keeping a hold on Lawton's hand. He pulled him close again, into a pleading, desperate kiss. He embraced the man fully before he had a chance to escape.

“Just be careful, Floyd,” he said. “Be careful with yourself.”

“I'll be fine, Bruce,” Floyd said, trying to push away. “Jesus. Since when are you so clingy? Let me go, would you?”

Bruce turned him towards the bedroom door and gave him a pushing swat on the bottom.

“Fine. Go.” He sighed. “Just go, Floyd.”

Floyd went, without looking back. He would have given anything to have been able to stay, but the damn butler was right: he was a coward. His physical lust was temporarily depleted, but the temptation to meld into the sedate intimacy of mere closeness was strong. He could have laid in bed with Bruce and wasted the entire day away dozing, conversing, simply _being with_ another person.

Instead, Lawton decided to spend as much of the day as possible in the company of a bottle. Outside the Wayne manor, he removed a flask from his jacket pocket and took a long drink. He thought he felt Bruce's eyes on him through one of the windows. He did not check to see if he was right.

Bruce did watch Lawton leave the grounds from his bedroom's balcony doors. He looked lonely down there, starkly painted in his dark clothes and dark hair against all the snow on the ground. He stopped to take something out of his jacket and tip it back to his mouth. Bruce wondered if he drank often. He wondered a lot of things about Floyd Lawton.

More than anything, he wondered how he would ever be able to hurt the man again.


	5. For Their Own Good

[November 23, 2014]

Police Commissioner Jim Gordon was responsible for coordinating the Gotham Police Department in securing all areas in and around Gothan International Airport prior to the arrival of the CIA jet bringing Kassan Shadid stateside. With Gordon in the hospital recovering from a gunshot wound, Detective Harvey Bullock was left to coordinate the security efforts.

“And you're sure he'll bite?”

Floyd Lawton was relaxing on the couch in General Walter Halloran's home office. Halloran was smoking a cigar, glowering at Lawton's overly familiar way of throwing himself across the couch. Lawton had his guns disassembled on the table beside the couch, and was cleaning the parts with the care of a parent bathing a child.

“Bullock is already bought and paid for,” Halloran said. “Fifty grand to ignore a single building fifteen-hundred yards from the airport? Of course he'd 'bite'. What about you? Can you make the shot?”

“I've done over four-thousand yard shots easy,” Lawton said. “You know I have. I'll make the damn shot.”

Halloran knew that he would. Whatever else he was, Lawton was a hell of a sniper. Halloran deeply regretted having lost him to the self-employed sector. It had not been long after that child bomber had been shot, and Bruce Wayne had left; Floyd's contract had ended and no amount of persuasion, insulting, or threatening had convinced him to re-sign. So far, his contracts had not been specifically problematic for the US government, but on the day that they were, Halloran wondered what would be done about him. It would be a shame for such a valuable asset to have to be put down.

In truth, Walter did not _want_ Lawton put down. Having been saddled with such a poor excuse for a son, Walter had some admiration for Floyd's talent and strength of will. All he needed was discipline, forced if necessary.

Walter tapped one of the folders on his desk. He had recently met a determined woman about half his age that surprisingly agreed with this line of thinking. Amanda Waller was new to Washington, and though she came from the same city as the President, she was his complete opposite: a conservative woman who believed in a strong military and a hard-line foreign policy. The folder on the desk contained one of her preliminary reports regarding a proposal for a new version of the 'Suicide Squad' government task force: a program to force talented criminals into government service under threat of immediate execution upon failure or attempted escape. Walter quite liked the woman. He doubted she would get the plans passed through by the current administration, but still, she had some good ideas.

The door to the office opened suddenly, and Robert came in. He stopped halfway into the office, noticing Lawton lying on his stomach along the length of the couch. He looked at him, over at his father, and coughed from the thick cigar smoke.

“Didn't I tell you to knock before you come in here?” Walter said to his son irritably. “What do you want, Robert?”

Bobby's attention was on Floyd, however.

“Where have you been?” he asked, his annoyed tone oddly similar to his father's despite his voice's lack of smoke-induced rasp. “I haven't seen you since that damn party.”

“I'm at the Gotham Regal,” Floyd said. He glanced up at the younger man expressionlessly. “I don't think it's gonna work out with us, Bobby.”

“Yeah, I don't think so,” Bobby said tersely. He eyed the guns warily, shook his head, and walked up to his father's desk. “Dad, can I get the keys to the blue Benz?”

“Why? What did you do to your car?”

“Nothing! It just needed an oil change!” Bobby said defensively. “Dad, please?”

“No,” Walter said. “If you need to go somewhere, Mason can drive you.”

“DAD!”

Lawton was smirking at the petty little domestic scene. Walter winced at his son's perpetual whine, and catching Floyd's expression further infuriated him. Bobby looked depressed, however, and he softened a little. At least the boy seemed relatively sober this morning.

“Here.” Walter removed a car key from his key ring and tossed it across the desk. “You get another DUI or crash into so much as a stray snowflake, and you're never getting anything better than a bus pass, do you understand me?”

“Public transportation?” muttered Bobby. “Talk about cruel and unusual.”

Walter sighed, shutting his eyes briefly. When he looked up, Bobby was putting the key on his own key ring. He noticed that his son still had his old leather fob on the ring, with the train embossed on it. He had given it to him when he was twelve, on a birthday. Walter thought of all the years wasted between them since then, and he felt far older than his fifty-six years.

“You ok, dad?” Bobby asked. “Maybe you shouldn't be smoking so much, you know? They have those things now—E-cigarettes, you know? They're supposed to be better.”

Floyd snorted with stifled laughter, and bowed his head over his guns. Walter could see the edge of his smile. Bobby tensed, but ignored him.

“I'm cutting down slowly, son,” Walter said wearily. “How about you cut down on the cocaine? Or the drinking? Then we can talk.”

Bobby swallowed, his cheeks reddening. He pocketed the keys.

“Whatever.”

When he had left, shutting the door behind him, Lawton mimicked his petulant tone, “What-EVER.”

“Shut up, Lawton,” Walter snapped. “At least Robert had the sense to ditch you.”

Floyd sat up, wiping a long piece of metal with a dirty rag.

“What about _you_ in all this? Are you going to get cold feet?”

“Me? Of course not,” Walter said. “Don't be ridiculous.”

“Not even because of _Bobby_?”

“Robert will never know about any of this,” Walter said. He pointed over the desk at Lawton. “You breathe a word of it to him, and I swear, you'll be in federal prison so fast your superior eyes will pop out of your head.”

“Calm down. I'm a professional, remember?” Floyd said. “You don't get to slap me around, and I don't _need_ to be slapped around. Fucking Christ, didn't you see my contract? Don't you know my damn record?”

“I know who Deadshot purports to be,” Walter said. He leaned back in his chair, taking a long drag on his cigar and squinting his eyes at Lawton. “I also know who you _are_.”

“I've changed,” Floyd said. He snapped the pieces of his gun back together: it was the finished version of the prototype wrist-mounted guns he had started work on six years ago. He fastened the thin metal band around his wrist and shut one eye to look through the powerful miniature scope. “Maybe I'm not the great war hero you think you are, that you wanted your precious Robert to be, maybe what you wanted _me_ to be … but I have changed. I'm all grown up now, _dad_.”

“Is it something about your generation, Lawton?” Walter grumbled. “Why is everyone from Robert's age to yours and Bruce's so goddamned difficult? What ever happened to respect? Serving your country, your family, just to serve them and make them proud? I've never been a damned idealist, I know every bloated red wart on the face of this country, but you kids are ridiculous.”

“Speeches now!” Floyd exclaimed. He aimed the wrist-mounted gun at General Halloran. “You've changed, too. I remember you being more of a hard ass. Things are black and white, remember? 'Some men have it, and some of you snot-nosed cowards just don't', didn't you say that? Why are you bitching about it now?”

“Because it's disappointing, Lawton,” Walter said, ignoring the jibes. He was quiet for a moment, and snubbed out the last of his cigar. “You'd never understand because you're not the kind of man that gives a shit about anyone but himself. Robert is the same. Bruce cares, but he's a hero-by-the-charity-check. But if a man has any kind of care to give for anything other than himself, it is disappointing. It's damn disappointing to see it all shot to shit in the end.”

Floyd raised his eyebrows.

“In what end?”

Walter waved a hand through the cloud of smoke, sending it rippling in the bright winter sunlight shining through the window behind his desk.

“Forget it, Lawton,” Halloran said. “You'd never understand any of it, anyway.”

Floyd shrugged, and returned to fussing with his weapons.

* * *

Bruce Wayne watched the morning scene in Halloran's office over lunch the same day. He removed his headphones and closed the video feed off once Floyd left Walter's office shortly after the end of their conversation. Bruce ran some searches on his computer, then sat back in his chair to consider the scene.

 _He finally finished that wrist gun_ , Bruce thought. _Why does he need a short range gun, though? Does he expect to use that against Batman? Wonderful._

Bruce frowned, and then smiled. Perhaps Lawton's intention to shoot the Batman would come in handy. He still needed to prove to Lawton that he was not the caped crusader, after all. Bruce began to formulate a rudimentary plan, and then set this bit of minor information aside.

Alfred came down to retrieve Bruce's empty lunch plates. By this time, Bruce's searches had finished running. If he worked for any single law enforcement agency, he would have had to get permission to access even a fraction of these files, and the classified cross-agency files would be forever inaccessible. Bruce had a state-of-the-art system at his fingertips, however, and kept his hacking skills and programs current enough to reach any electronic documents from any agency or institution he needed: police, FBI, CIA, patient files from hospitals, and those from most major corporations (though a few remained encrypted beyond even his reach).

“General Halloran is dying.”

Alfred raised his eyebrows. Walter Halloran and his wife (before she divorced him and disappeared) were frequent visitors at the Wayne estate. Walter was one of those men that always seems to be as hard on the inside as they were outside: one expected such men to live forever, unrealistic as that is.

“Lung cancer. Halloran has been visiting doctors all over Europe and Asia,” Bruce said, bringing up several documents, many of them in foreign languages Bruce knew well enough to mentally translate. “He's even tried holistic and alternative treatments. It says that he's scheduled for radiation therapy in D.C. in December.”

Bruce put his computer in sleep mode and followed Alfred back upstairs. The lights in the cave went dark with the touch of a hidden button at the top of the stairs. The cave entrance slid open, and then the hidden passage behind a sliding grandfather clock closed back into nonexistence. The winter sunlight bouncing off of the snow outside brought strong white light into the mansion's upper floors, wafting lazily across the fine furniture and sparse décor. Though Alfred spent his days keeping everything clean, small motes of dust still floated through the light, as it always did in old, underused homes.

“General Halloran is dying, and he sees his entire life crumbling beneath him,” Bruce spoke his theory aloud, to himself and Alfred. “In his eyes, his son is a failure, his country has gone soft, and for some reason he's even bothered about the way Floyd Lawton turned out. Halloran doesn't consider himself a villain, not even a traitor. He gets Gordon out of the way with as minimal injury as possible, and pays Harvey Bullock to ignore the potential sniper's nest Lawton will use to take the shot at Kassan Shadid.”

“Revenge, sir?”

“No,” Bruce said. He stopped walking in the kitchen doorway, thinking, his fist rested on his chin. “The deal the US government made with Shadid made history: controversial history. Shadid will provide valuable intelligence on the terrorist cells he oversaw and will face justice, likely the death penalty. The deal was approved by the United Nations, and many of our allies in the Middle East applaud the mercy the President is taking on the innocent women and children of the Shadid family. But conservatives and many of the military sector disapprove of cutting a deal to protect and grant citizenship to the family of a known terrorist. It's been the country's stance for so long that we don't negotiate with terrorists that many people like General Halloran are completely outraged.”

“If Mr. Shadid were to be assassinated upon reaching US shores, I can't imagine that will make our country look very respectable, internationally,” Alfred said. He set the dishes into the sink, removed his jacket, rolled up his shirt sleeves, and set to washing them. “I daresay it would look rather suspicious.”

“Deadshot is a free agent, so the kill will be completely untraceable,” Bruce said. “It will be very easy for anyone to accuse our government of contracting it. The outrage will be resounding, and it could lead to serious backlash.”

“Do you think that is what General Halloran wants?” Alfred asked. “To ruin this country as punishment for it going 'soft', as he believes?”

Bruce considered the question for a long minute.

“I can't bring myself to believe that,” he finally replied. “General Halloran gets angry often, at his son and his country, at Lawton, but only when he cares. I saw him not even blink when Floyd shot that child bomber six years ago. The look in his eyes was grim, pragmatic: he wasn't happy over the death, but he figured that at least it was the other side that lost, and not his side. It's the military mindset, that ability to divide the world into neat slices of unwavering loyalties. Halloran would never betray his country.”

Alfred nodded, familiar with the type.

“But he would hurt his country for its own good, wouldn't he, sir?”

“Exactly, Alfred,” Bruce said. “Lawton mentioned the way the General would slap him around back when, so the one time I witnessed could not have been the only incident of abuse. He never physically hurt Bobby except for a few childhood spankings, but he was very cutting with his words and rules. Halloran is a firm believer in discipline, in punishment for the sake of one's own good. It makes sense that he would apply those beliefs to the country. Assassinating Shadid is Walter's way of giving this country a wake-up call.”

Alfred shook his head. He had served in the British military many years ago, but he could see that the global mentality of warriors never changed. It was wearying to think of.

“My greatest fear is that this is only the first step in a plan of the General's,” Bruce said. “Alfred, I think he might be out to send this country back to war. A final war, whatever that means to him. A conflict with no end but destruction: one side or the other loses everything. If he's afraid of dying, he might not even care about how dangerous a worldwide war would be in this nuclear age.”

“Would he go so far?” Alfred asked. “Walter Halloran was a very good friend of your father's. He was never the same after his wife left him, true, but he has tried his best to raise young Master Robert well. I understand that evil is grown in humans, some of them who tried their best to be good, but it's still … rather hard to fathom. Disappointing, I suppose.”

“Halloran used the exact same word this morning,” Bruce said. “I almost feel that it's a mercy that I could never be more disappointed than I was as a child.”

Alfred turned from the sink, eyes stricken. “Master Bruce—”

“I know,” Bruce said heavily. “It isn't even true. This entire situation is eating away at me. I _thought_ that I was safe from disappointment, that I would never misplace faith in humanity again … and then Floyd Lawton became 'Deadshot', General Halloran wants to go to war, Bobby's living like he's still twenty-one … The more I reconnect to the city and my old life, the more disappointed I become. Even me, Alfred, I told you the way Harvey Dent looked at me when we met. I'm proud of Batman, but Bruce Wayne, the child that carries the legacy of my parents, is a big-talking checkbook-philanthropist.”

“Sir, you were aware of the sacrifices when you began this,” Alfred said gently. He dried the last of the dishes and set them in a cabinet. He dried his hands on a towel and walked over to Bruce. “You do see that it is not too late to reevaluate your priorities, sir? To give a bit more time to Bruce Wayne than to Batman?”

“I can never balance my time evenly,” Bruce said. “I wish that I could show the world a better Bruce Wayne, but I simply do not have the time, Alfred.”

“I understand that, sir,” Alfred said. He paused. “However, perhaps there are ways to better use the time that you do have?”

Bruce thought, nodded.

“You may have a point, Alfred.” He smiled, briefly gripping his butler's shoulder. “Thank you.”

Alfred's thin lips barely twitched upward, but there was love in his eyes. Nonetheless, his tone was as formal as ever when he merely said, “Of course, sir.”

“Still, I never intended for Batman _or_ Bruce Wayne to be dragged into this kind of political nightmare,” Bruce said wearily. He fetched a glass of water and drank. “Even Superman stays out of politics, thank goodness for us all. I'll have to walk this line very carefully to avoid Batman becoming an enemy _or_ ally of the government. General Halloran is highly connected.”

“If you can't reach the General, perhaps you should try to remove the assassin from the equation,” Alfred said. “Will you be able to put Floyd Lawton out of the game, sir?”

“Out of the game, Alfred?”

“I watch television at times, sir.”

“I'll put Lawton down,” Bruce said. “Batman will take him down. Bruce will … try to get that done before he pulls any trigger. I'll give Lawton one chance to get out of Gotham and stay out of prison. That's more than most people get. I can't balance any further than that.”

“Good luck, sir.”

“I have a feeling I'll need it.”

* * *

Batman spent the evening watching Floyd Lawton. He had tracked the man to his room at the Gotham Regal, and watched through binoculars from a building across the street from it. Through the window, he saw Bruce Wayne's lover drink the evening away, spend some time with a professional escort, send her away, shower, and drink some more over an early room service dinner. Lawton's devil-may-care act was not only an affectation, Batman noted, but a lifestyle.

At eight-o-clock, Floyd left the hotel. It was a cold night, so he shrugged into a long black winter coat on his way out. Outside, he got into his inconspicuous rental car, and headed across Gotham towards the International Airport. He had no idea that Batman was slipping through the shadows above on his tail.

Floyd had checked in with Harvey Bullock personally (masked and with a voice changer warping any identifying traces of his real voice). The startled detective had assured him that the GCPD would not be patrolling the building Floyd intended to use as a nest, in fact they had been told to steer clear of the area. With the local cops out of the way, Lawton was free to take a measure of the place.

The building was a condemned apartment building, no different from any of the many abandoned buildings Lawton had shot from the world over. On second thought, Lawton realized, it was situated closer to two-thousand yards from the airport than fifteen-hundred. Still not a problem, distance-wise. He now saw the wisdom in Halloran insisting he take Gordon out temporarily: without the cop in charge being bought, there was no way the GCPD wouldn't lock down every block in a two-thousand-yard perimeter, at least. On the other hand, if Gordon had been killed, no amount of money could prevent the police from coming out full force. The crafty old bastard General knew his tactics.

In the car, Floyd removed his coat, shirt, and jeans. He was wearing a skintight red suit of molded, thin military-grade motion armor (allowing for full range of motion while providing a tough outer skin, though not bulletproof) beneath his clothing. He snapped a complicated set of ammunition holders on: a harness-like unit around his upper torso, a black leather utility belt with bullets and other supplies around his waist, and the bracelets that fed into his wrist-mounted guns on each arm. He put on the very thin yellow gloves he had specially molded to his hands, and then shielded his face with a whitish-chrome metal and fiber mask. The hood ran down and tucked into the top of his suit's shirt, using more metal down the neck area for protection. There was a scope built into the mask that Floyd could turn up over his left eye when it came time to take aim.

“All dressed up and nowhere to go,” Deadshot chuckled to himself. His voice was distorted into anonymity by the mask's built-in modifier. He did not really think gearing up like this was necessary simply to case the potential nest, but he had heard the tales of the Batman. How embarrassing would it be to be caught by the winged moron with his pants down?

Deadshot exited the rental car, and headed for the building. The complicated mesh of his mask filtered the air somewhat, but he could still smell stale urine, rodent feces, old alcohol, vomit, rotting wood, and whatever treacherous chemicals the ancient domicile had been built with. The tang was sharper in Gotham, Deadshot thought, composed of more toxins. There was a strange, rubbery, garbage scent that he had never smelled in another city before. Every city had particular note like that: Moscow's was distinctly vodka and cheap food mixed with the eternal paradoxically clean note of snow; Paris usually smelled of days-old bread and vinegary cheap wine, while France's countryside always had the scent of greenery; Metropolis smelled of concrete and melting, rotting newspapers that littered the streets (Floyd could not understand why the _Daily Planet_ still printed so many copies).

“ _I've been all over the world_ ,” Deadshot hummed to himself, quoting one of the million songs to that effect that he had heard at some club. His boots thumped loudly up the old stairs, the sound magnified by the audio enhancers sewn into his mask over the ears. He heard the scurry of rodents and insects, but Bullock had been true to his word and cleared the building out of its usual vagrants.

The top floor had been interrupted in the middle of some ill-planned remodeling project, and was devoid of drywall. Raw brick walls framed the large square space, and the only traces of rooms were wooden beams dividing the space. Deadshot made straight for the window facing the airport. He flipped the mask's red scope over his left eye, and slung off the rifle on his back. He knelt down, pressing the scope on the mask over the one on the gun: the combined effect gave double the magnification and vision enhancement; he could also cycle the mask's scope into infrared or thermal imaging via a tiny button in the lens's rim.

 _Nice, nice,_ Deadshot thought of his relatively new equipment. _Guess it was worth it playin' nice with the military. Halloran's company has the best Weapons R &D department in the country, other than S.T.A.R. Labs. Bastard must be rollin' in money, making equipment like this._

Deadshot scoped the airport carefully, playing with magnification and vision settings. He got the private hangar where the government plane would be landing in his sights. He shut his eyes briefly, then opened them, clearly imagining the plane filling the hangar, the procession of agents escorting the target off the CIA jet. They had run several simulations of the angles and positions likely to be used. Deadshot went over them all, very slightly changing the position and aim of the rifle depending upon each scenario. He had read the weather forecast, and had a good idea of the needed trajectory depending on wind velocity and all the other factors. He had never been good at math, yet he had an oddly adept grasp on the mathematics involved in long-distance shooting. Talent worked in mysterious ways. He tried not to think of the implications of it being some kind of destiny.

“Easy shot,” Deadshot finally judged. He stood up, slinging the rifle in its holster across his back. He smiled under his mask. “Easy money.”

“I wouldn't be so sure about that.”

Deadshot whirled around, taking the safety off his left wrist gun in one smooth motion. He aimed into the darkness, but saw nothing but shadow. Keeping his arm up and straight, he switched his left eye scope to night vision. Still nothing.

“I was wonderin' if you'd show,” Deadshot said, walking carefully with his back to the wall, head turning back and forth to survey the room. “Don't you wanna come out and shake my hand? _Batman_?”

Batman dropped from one of the wood beams across where the ceiling should have been. Deadshot fired a line of bullets in his direction. He hated to admit it, but he was excited: blood throbbed through his veins, his heartbeat sped up, and his nerves of steel were so taut they might snap at any moment. So this was the one thing he missed about the military: surprises. Who would have thought?

Batman outran the line of fire, throwing something towards Deadshot. Deadshot narrowly missed his mask's scope lens being shattered by a … bat-shaped boomerang? Deadshot glanced at the thing, and it was indeed bat-shaped, but also dangerously sharp-edged. Deadshot crouched low and quickly crab-walked away from his previous position. He surveyed the room again, trying to fix Batman's location.

Batman dropped down _beside_ him. Deadshot was alarmed, and jumped aside, rolled, and shot at the man again. God, he was _fast_! He heard a grunt, and the sound of a bullet striking home. Deadshot grinned beneath the mask. So, the great Batman was mortal after all! Any mortal thing's name could easily be written on a bullet. Deadshot imagined that this must be what big game hunters must feel before taking the life of their chosen prey.

Batman swerved around, and grabbed Deadshot from behind before he could even track him. Deadshot elbowed over his shoulder, but his elbow hit Batman's mask and a jolt of pain shot up his arm. Armored. Military-grade—did everyone have military-grade or better-quality costumes these days? Whatever happened to the days of spandex aerobic gear and silk domino masks? Deadshot cursed modern so-called 'superheroes' as he jerked into Batman, then slipped down from under his grip. He turned and faced the man, using his good arm to jab experimentally at the man's midsection. As he did, he caught a glimpse of a hole in Batman's chest armor, and dark blood leaking out of it. Grim determination flowed through Deadshot: if he had shot Batman once, he _would_ do it again.

Hand-to-hand combat quickly became inefficient. Deadshot preferred guns, but he had fought enough fistfights to gauge a match. Batman was the better fighter, and Deadshot knew that if his own skills had been a shred less honed, the fight would have been over already. Batman attempted a lot of restraining moves, obviously trying to put him down and eliminate the threat as expediently as possible. If Deadshot could not get another, fatal bullet in him, this would be the end of his illustrious career.

“Do you even know who I am?” Deadshot asked. He did not think Batman was the type to be distracted by talk, but it was worth the attempt. The two men were circling each other at a distance.

“Deadshot: professional assassin hired by General Walter Halloran to assassinate Kassan Shadid.”

Deadshot's plan to distract Batman backfired, and _he_ was the one distracted. How the hell could Batman have known all of this? If he was busted mid-contract and his employer was exposed, no one would ever trust him professionally again. Furious, Deadshot opened up from his wrist gun again. Darkness swirled—Deadshot realized the cape was what enlarged Batman as a target, rendered him practically invisible in the shadows. It also deflected his thermal imaging due to some treatment or fabric: all Deadshot saw in thermal or infrared or night vision was a large, shifting dark blot.

“So what do you care?” Deadshot shouted into the darkness. “Look, I'm a professional. I can pay you. And you take down bad guys, right? That's all I'm doing.” ( _This time,_ he thought, though he bit the words off his tongue.)

“You're not going to take that shot.”

The shadows moved and Deadshot fired at them. It was a diversion: only the cape. He realized this two seconds after Batman came down around him again and grabbed both of his arms. They wrestled, but Batman head-butted him. The blow struck through Floyd's mask as if it were a plastic shopping bag, the impact hitting with full force and knocking Lawton dizzy. He struggled, the wrist guns going off into the darkness, but Batman's knee sank into his midsection. Pain ripped through Deadshot, doubling him over. The guns were snatched from his wrists, and he heard them clatter as they hit the floor across the room.

Batman took Deadshot by the front fabric of his suit and lifted him off the floor a few inches. Deadshot struggled, but weakly. He was still unfocused from the blow to the head.

“I won't let you bring your violence to Gotham. I won't let you dirty this city's name with an international incident.”

“Yeah?” Deadshot put his hands on Batman's gauntlet gloves, noting the sharp blades lining the arms, the thickness of the padding around the fists. He could barely get his breath back after the blow to the stomach, but he managed to talk, kick, and otherwise attempt escape. “Yeah? How you gonna stop me, huh?”

Deadshot brought both legs up and directed his feet into a blow at Batman's midsection. He was released, dropped, rolled. He went to aim with the wrist guns, but they were gone. He cursed, and unshouldered his rifle. There was no clear shot. He swore again.

Deadshot had heard that Batman did not kill his opponents. He thought he could probably rely upon this fact, given that after two years Batman still had not killed a single one of his freakish enemies, not even the Joker. Deadshot moved through the room, keeping all his senses alert, waiting for Batman to attack him as he pretended to try and get a clear line of fire. He wondered why he never heard a sound when Batman moved, even with the enhanced audio the ear pieces in the mask offered.

Batman must have anticipated the trap. Before he knew what had happened, Deadshot's feet were entangled together in rope, and he went down on his face. Grimacing under the mask, he glanced back over his shoulder. Weighted ropes were wrapped around his ankles and lower legs. Bolas, Deadshot thought, an old and unexpected weapon. Nice. He gritted his teeth, reaching into his utility belt for a knife.

Before he could, Batman grabbed both his arms and pinned them to the small of his back. Deadshot growled in frustration and dismay. He was oddly reminded of Bruce, as he was also given to this form of restraint. He wondered about his earlier suspicions about Bruce being Batman. Tough as Bruce was, could he be this masked monster? A part of him doubted it … another part didn't.

“I haven't pulled any trigger!” Deadshot shouted up at Batman. “What the hell are you gonna do? Take me up to the GCPD and have me arrested for having a few guns and a nice costume? HA! I haven't taken any shots! You can't prove a goddamn thing!”

“I know.”

Deadshot—Floyd—tried to hear Bruce's tones in the voice. There was only minimal voice modification, but Batman spoke in a low, slight rasp that made it naturally ambiguous. Vocal training, Deadshot expected. He had heard of some assassins and other costumes that used that old-fashioned way of disguising their voices. This guy had to be older than Bruce, didn't he? It was a very old technique, no one living ten years into the digital age used it.

“I said,” the soft but powerful voice whispered near Deadshot's ear, “that I won't let you _take_ the shot.”

“And I said, you're not gonna stop me,” Deadshot snarled. “As long as I can pull that trigger, I'm gonna hit my target! I'll be there day after tomorrow! I'll be here or somewhere else, somewhere you can't get to me, and I'm gonna PULL THAT TRIGGER!”

“No. You're not.”

There was a sickening crunching sound in Deadshot's electronically-enhanced ears, and pain shot up both his arms. The pain was sharp and hot, screaming through him and blotting out all other now-minor pains. Deadshot screamed, the sound oddly distorted by the electronic voice modifier. He screamed again, aware of nothing but the pain and spreading numbness in both arms. Vomit retched up inside him, but he held it. He realized that his arms were free, the weight of the other man gone from over him. He tried to remove his mask, but his hands did not work. Cursing and trying not to vomit, he used his wrists to push the mask off. He gulped the stagnant air, got to his knees (the bolas was gone from his legs), and threw up onto the rotting wood floor. Sweat stuck his dark hair to his very pale face, and he was trembling. He spit the rest of the vomit and spit onto the floor, and crawled away from the mess, mask tucked under his armpit.

Floyd bit the ends of the fingers of his gloves and pulled them off slowly. His long, delicate and strong fingers were splayed at odd angles, some of them twitching. He pressed along each hand with his wrist, and felt bones broken. Fear shot through him, cold and dark. Batman did not kill his enemies, but did he disable them? Would his hands ever work again? Impotent fury tore through him, fury and shame and misery. Was this how it ended? Not even a big death, just invalidity? What the hell would he do with himself if he couldn't shoot again?

Floyd took a deep breath and let it out. Reactionary tears slipped from his eyes, but he ignored them. First thing was first. He needed medical attention. Deadshot could not seek out a hospital, but Floyd (or any one of his aliases) could.

Lawton forced himself to his feet. He gathered his wrist guns (undamaged, he was happy to see, despite everything), equipment, and made certain he had his mask firmly under his arm. He made his way out of the building, down to the car. It took a lot of effort to strip off his costume without functioning fingers, but he managed.

He realized then that he could not drive.

Floyd screamed once more, of pain and helplessness. He had not been helpless in a very long time, lost in a sea of pain that could not be fought or faced. He kicked the car repeatedly, cursing and shouting. When the rage had worn away, he bowed his head against the steering wheel, and all he could do was cry.


	6. Everyone Has A Dark Side

[November 24, 2014, Wayne Manor]

Bruce was awakened at two-o-clock in the morning by urgent knocking at his bedroom door. He was exhausted from the confrontation last night, but managed to climb out of bed. He rubbed his face, and slipped a black silk robe over his matching pajama pants. He opened to door to find a very worried-looking Alfred, in full night dress.

“Mr. Lawton is at the door,” Alfred said wearily. “He seems quite upset, sir. In fact—”

There was the sound of pounding footsteps on the main stairwell. Alfred sighed.

“—I wouldn't be surprised if he had broken into the house,” Alfred finished.

“I'll take care of it, Alfred,” Bruce assured him, sounding more confident than he felt. “Thank you.”

The words had barely left his mouth when Floyd Lawton shoved Alfred aside and faced Bruce. His sharp face was steely with anger, his light eyes glistening, and he glared up at Bruce intensely. Both his hands were bandaged from between the fingers to the elbows in hard casts. Nonetheless, he managed to push open Bruce's robe. He studied his chest closely, nearly throwing the robe off. Bruce knew he was looking for the bullet wound Lawton thought he had inflicted on Batman. Given that it had been a false cap of fake blood that Batman had set off to simulate a gunshot wound, he knew that he would not find it.

“Floyd? What the hell are you doing?” Bruce asked, pretending not to know. “What happened to you?”

“You're not him.” Floyd looked up at Bruce in shock and relief. “Holy fuck, you're not him! Oh thank—Christ, you're not him. You're not him.”

Floyd's broken hands wrapped around Bruce's neck and he kissed him, deeply and fiercely. Bruce caught a glimpse of a very concerned and tired look on Alfred's face, before the servant shook his head and left down the hall. Bruce pulled Floyd further into the bedroom and swung the door shut behind them.

“What happened to you?” Bruce asked between kisses. “What happened to your hands, Floyd?”

“Shut up.”

“Floyd—”

“Shut up!” Lawton shouted. “Shut up! Just shut up! Shut up, Bruce.”

Bruce could take a hint. Questions could wait. He knew Lawton did not deal with pain well without action: any type of it. After all, he had watched him as he swore and cried alone in the car he could not drive with his hands broken.

* * *

After, Floyd put on one of Bruce's robes and left the bedroom. Bruce thought he had gone to the bathroom, but Lawton returned with a bottle of whiskey awkwardly clutched in his bandaged hands. He settled back on the bed beside Bruce, screwing off the bottle's cap with his teeth. It took some balancing with his bandaged wrists and knees, but he managed to get the bottle to his lips and take a long drink. Bruce watched with mingled concern and admiration; Lawton was not a man to be kept down long.

“What happened, Floyd?” Bruce asked, pulling the man against his shoulder. He caressed his arm, trying not to look at the bandages. He had gone from the pure adrenaline of combat to exhaustion, and then been set to repeat the same cycle in a very different way when Lawton showed up at his bedroom door. The guilt had been kept at bay so far, but now it was beginning to gnaw at him. “Tell me what happened.”

Floyd exhaled in frustration. There was a flush in his cheeks, obviously he was embarrassed over his defeat at Batman's hands. He took some more drinks, and began to tell Bruce about the night's events. The more he drank, the more he talked. His emotions began to show through, the anger and frustration and shame, all of it.

 _It's a good thing he wore a mask when I confronted him,_ Bruce thought. He held Floyd tightly as he talked, and now kissed his shoulder. _If I had seen his eyes, all these feelings … If he had been a man, not only the assassin Deadshot … Could I have done it? A part of me doesn't even want to know if I could … Another part knows that I would._

“He broke your hands?” Bruce echoed, feigning shock to disguise the lump in his throat. The guilt came in waves now, and he knew fighting it would do no good. All he could do was be sorry and hold his foe and lover. “Just like that?”

“Just like that,” Floyd confirmed softly. He took a long drink from the half-empty bottle. “Yeah, he broke my hands. The hospital said there wouldn't be any permanent damage. Months of rehabilitation therapy, though. Can you believe that?” He laughed drunkenly. “I'll be squeezing stress balls and trying to make a fist for weeks. Think we can make some interesting games out of those activities? Huh, playboy?”

Bruce lifted one of his cast-swathed arms. He touched the visible tips of fingers splayed out between the hard cast, and then kissed them.

“I always thought you had such beautiful hands: strong but thin, elegant, long fingers like a pianist.”

“Pianist, huh?” Floyd laughed long and hard at that. “A pianist! You're such a fucking rich boy, Bruce. Oh God! A pianist! Ha ha ha ha ha!”

Bruce shut him up with a kiss. It tasted like whiskey.

“I know you're not a pianist, Floyd.”

“Hell no.” Floyd kissed the side of Bruce's mouth, took another swig of liquor. “You into all that, Bruce? Orchestras and operas and shit?”

“Sometimes,” Bruce said softly. He realized how little they knew about each other, though they'd shared so much. “You?”

“Nah, I like … I don't know, music that shuts off your brain, you know?” Lawton said. “Loud. Angry. It's like it's screaming for you, so you don't have to. Helped me calm my nerves back overseas. Got my hands steady.”

Bruce smiled, caressing his back. Lawton was drunk. He did not mind.

“My hands are always steady now,” Floyd said, looking at the casts. He sniffed, then scowled. “The hell with Batman. He thinks this will stop me?”

Bruce's blood froze in his veins.

“This won't stop me,” Floyd said, arrogantly lifting his face. “I'll rig something up. You told me I should work in your R&D department, remember? Developing weapons and stuff? Batman thinks only my fingers can pull a trigger? Ha ha! I can pull a trigger with my—”

“That's enough information,” Bruce cut him off. He took Floyd by the shoulders, as he was wont to do when giving him a serious talking-to. “Floyd, this Batman freak is dangerous. He's seriously hurt you. He might have permanently crippled you. Do you really want to test him?”

“ _He_ tested _me_ ,” Floyd said defensively. “I'm just doing a job. It has nothing to do with Batman. It has nothing to do with Gotham! Why is he butting in? He even knew my entire contract, everything! How the hell did he know? If he busts me and the person that hired me, I'm done. I could shoot the tit off a gerbil at two-thousand yards and no one would hire me. This Bat-freak is going to ruin my career! Why? To protect some terrorist? Who the hell cares? I thought all the super-idiots stayed out of politics.”

Bruce had had the same misgivings.

“They usually do. But this isn't—”

“Exactly!” Floyd said heatedly. He sat up, brushing his hair off his head with his arm. He took another swig from the bottle, and eyed the bottle to see how much was left, considering going down for another one. “So what is this? He told me that he wouldn't let me bring death and violence and international scandal to Gotham, something like that. The hell is his problem?”

“I don't know,” Bruce said quietly. “Hey, Floyd. I don't know what his problem is, and neither do you. This isn't a game. You could be—”

“What? I COULD BE WHAT!” Floyd shouted with inexplicable outrage. “I could be what? Killed? I could be _killed_ , Bruce? I could have been killed in the Marines! I could have been killed crossing the goddamn street! I don't give a damn about dying! Don't you get that? Christ, we played Russian Roulette together!”

“It wasn't together!” Bruce retorted, giving him a slight shake. “You almost shot yourself to prove a stupid point! You tormented me because you couldn't stand to torment yourself anymore. I don't care about your supposed death wish, Floyd. If you really wanted to die, you would have just shot yourself by now, given all the guns you've lived around. You say that you want to die, but you're here. Six years have passed, and you're still here. You've taken some pains to stay alive, haven't you? Living in danger all these years and still alive?”

“I'm … just … lucky.” Floyd shrugged, staring at his hands. He frowned, and looked back up at Bruce. “Fine. Fine, I'm not suicidal. You got me, all right? If I go, I want to go out big, but I'm not necessarily looking to go anywhere. Maybe I deserve to, I don't know. You're right, though. I don't want to die. But Batman doesn't kill, right?”

“No, but he does this!” Bruce snapped, holding both of Floyd's broken hands in his own. “What if he had broken bones that would permanently cripple you? What if he did worse than that? The Batman has only been in Gotham for two years. We don't know how stable he is, if he'll stay within his limits. And you're an international assassin. How many people _would_ kill you if they had the chance?”

Floyd shrugged again. “A lot?”

If Bruce had not spent the prior evening hurting Floyd, he might have had a violent reaction to his lackadaisical attitude. He brushed some of Floyd's hair off his face, stroked his cheek.

“You can't save me,” Floyd said, more serious than usual. He smiled sadly, an expression Bruce had never seen on his face before. “You couldn't save your parents. You can't save me. I couldn't save my parents. I couldn't save my brother, I killed him trying. I can't save me, either. Bruce, you just have to stop worrying. Jesus, you worry about everything. Your mind is always picking at every loose thread of the future. That's no way to live.”

“And are you living, Floyd?” Bruce asked. “Are you really living?”

“Who knows?” Floyd said honestly. He took a brief swig of liquor, swallowed, licked his lips. “Who the hell knows what living even is?”

Bruce kissed him, as if trying to breathe life into him. He felt hot tears fall onto his face, and knew they were Lawton's. He almost wished he could cry with him, but that part of him was gone. He held the man to his chest, kissing his ear, his neck, and then lay down with him on his chest. He took the bottle from Floyd and set it on the nightstand.

“This is what happens when you mix alcohol and painkillers,” Floyd said, giving a self-conscious laugh and trying to wipe the tears away with his arm. “You know the worst part? I felt worse than when I killed that kid. Even when I killed that kid, I only broke down because … because I saw my brother in him. And now I'm just as messed up, even more, because I thought I'd lose my hands. Because I thought I'd be cured of killing so easily. Can you believe that? God … the hell is wrong with me?”

Bruce could not speak. The tears actually did well in his eyes. He thought of the excuses Joe Chill had brought to court, and shuddered. He felt disloyal to his parents. He felt disloyal to Floyd. He felt torn between two personas, with no chance of finding which was his real soul.

Then again, he was not certain a 'soul' even existed.

“Shh. Just get some sleep, Floyd,” Bruce hushed him. “Go to sleep.”

“I'm a professional,” Floyd murmured, nodding off already. “Batman won't stop me. He could cut off my hands and feet, I'd find a way. It's my guarantee, Bruce. You know that? Deadshot's guarantee. As long 's I'm paid, I get my target. I _always_ get my target.”

Bruce kissed his forehead, though he was overrun with misery. The logical part of his brain realized that taking Deadshot out without touching Halloran was now out of the question: unless he got Halloran to cancel his contract on Shadid or put Deadshot in prison for a long enough period of time for the US to prosecute the terrorist, the hit would happen. The emotional part of his brain or proverbial “heart” hated the idea of Floyd pulling off a hit in Gotham, and having to send him to prison over it. It was horribly sentimental, and he hated himself for the bias he was unable to stifle. In the two years of being Batman, he had never faced a situation like this. He knew the way he dealt with it would define both Bruce Wayne and Batman for the rest of their time in Gotham.

Somehow, both men managed to fall asleep within the hour.

* * *

Morning came and went. Neither Bruce nor Floyd woke until near-afternoon. Bruce awoke first, surprised by the scent of another person in his bed, the warmth of flesh pressed to flesh. He remained in bed for some time, enjoying the feel of the man close to him.

Bruce could not keep his mind from turning. There was only one day until the hit on Shadid went down. He had to formulate a plan to stop Halloran. He had research to do. He needed …

He needed to be Batman today.

Bruce finally understood what it meant to be a soldier that morning. He saw some of the disconnection Walter Halloran felt from civilians. He kissed Floyd's cheek, and then shut his emotions off. He showered, dressed, and greeted the day with enough rationality to battle his way through it. He was grateful that he had the strength to do it, even as he wondered if it stemmed from his old trauma. Had a part of him shut down and never returned after his parents' murder? There was no time for introspection.

Floyd woke up in steps. He felt Bruce's lips on his forehead, but only buried himself in the sheets and slipped away again. There was a light pat on the bottom at one point, some murmured words, but he mumbled groggily and fell back into sleep. The haze the painkillers and liquor had induced was a blissful nirvana, and Floyd was loathe to surrender it.

The smell of food finally roused Lawton. He sat up groggily to find a tray of breakfast in Bruce's hands. For a moment, he thought he was still in some typical wish-fulfillment dream. Once he realized he was actually awake, he rolled out of bed, made his way to the bathroom. It took more time than it should have to tend to his morning routine with the damned casts on his hands, but he managed. By the time he was done, he was ready for a shot of vodka in his orange juice.

“No,” Bruce said firmly as he sat Floyd down on the bed and handed him his tray of food. “Eat. Drink the water. You already have enough garbage in your system without adding more.”

Floyd muttered in complaint, but he was starving. He ate and drank until the tray was empty. Bruce hovered around the room, grooming and setting things straight. He kept an eye on Lawton, though he knew better than to offer him help when his casts got in the way.

Bruce did help Floyd into his clothing, and Lawton allowed it. Floyd kissed and bit at him, but Bruce managed to keep him tame enough. All he wanted was to hold him and take him and keep him close. He knew their time together was running short. Lawton knew the same thing.

“Leaving so soon?” Bruce asked once Lawton was dressed.

“Yeah,” Floyd sighed. “It's been fun, Bruce, but I have a job to do.”

“Floyd—”

“Don't,” Lawton cut him off, though his tone was more tired than snappish. “Please don't go there, Bruce. I've already told you way too much about myself and my career. I've trusted you. If you had turned out to be that Batman bastard … I've been sloppy, stupid. You've made me stupid. I can't keep doing this. Not with you, not with anyone.”

“You mean, you have to shut down again?”

“Exactly,” Floyd said. He was kneeling, struggling with his boot's laces. “That's exactly what I have to do.”

Bruce knelt and tied his shoes for him. Lawton swore, but allowed it. He put a hand on the back of Bruce's neck, and their foreheads touched. They kissed, and it had the melancholy of a last one.

“I might not stick around Gotham for much longer after tonight,” Floyd said. “In case we don't cross paths again for a while, I … I just wanted to say, uh … Huh. Well, just that it has been good with you, Bruce. Six years ago, I never got to tell you that, but it was true then, and it's true now. I could have been happy with you, Bruce.”

“You still can be,” Bruce said, helping Lawton to his feet. He kept his hands rested on the man's shoulders. “Stay with me. We'll figure something out. We'll make it work.”

Even as Bruce made the offer, he knew it was impossible. His hands fell from Floyd's arms. Lawton saw the realization in his eyes, and smiled, the expression cynical and sad.

“Yeah, exactly,” he said. “But who knows? Maybe we'll have some more good times in the future if we happen across each other. I'll always … be up for it.”

Bruce rustled a hand through Lawton's hair. “I'll always love you, Floyd.”

“Yeah, well … ” Floyd could not bring himself to say the words. He cleared his throat, and gave Bruce's mouth a quick kiss. “I'll be looking forward to next time.”

Lawton left before he was tempted to stay. Bruce left the house soon after him, unable to stand still while his heart was breaking. Sometimes shutting down could be a blessing.

* * *

Bruce drove into the city, pondering what to do next. If he raised the alarm on the hit to Harvey Dent, Lawton could be set up and arrested for attempted murder. Putting aside his uncharacteristic hesitance to keep Lawton from jail, this plan was not very reliable or a permanent solution: Deadshot always hit his target, and if the charges did not stick (likely, given Halloran's connections), he would disappear until he had the chance to take another shot at Shadid. So long as Halloran kept the contract on, Floyd would always be after his target. Given the fight Deadshot had put up the previous night, Bruce doubted whether the police would even be able to pull off a trap, even with Lawton's compromised hands. Bullock did not bother trying to capture Batman much, but he would be on the defensive given his role in this plot; it might be difficult for Batman to help the police if they were ordered to capture him by Bullock. There was also nothing stopping Halloran from hiring a different assassin for the contract if Lawton was incarcerated.

Bruce knew that he would have to go after Walter Halloran directly, but he had no idea how to do this. Halloran was not a man that would be taken down easily: he was a career soldier as well as the Chairman and CEO of HalloTech, a company that developed weapons and technology for the US military. He might not like the current US President, but Halloran had still dined with him, along with every other important political and military figure in the country. The illegally-accessed proof Batman had linking him to the Shadid contract was very thin, and would never stand up in court. Even making the accusation against Halloran would make Batman an enemy of the government and most likely even more hunted by the GPD. Even Gordon wouldn't be able to use his help at that point.

There was a press conference going on at City Hall. Bruce parked and walked through the crowd of journalists and gawkers. Harvey Dent was ending a statement.

“ … will do everything in our power to find the culprit of this deplorable attempt on the Commissioner's life,” he was saying. “Justice will be done, I assure you. I will take some of your questions at this time.”

Bruce felt guilty, knowing the man responsible for the shooting and feeling so reluctant to jail him. It was cruel, but he was relieved that this second brief affair with Lawton was over; his mind was letting go of him, even if his heart had not yet. For the first time, he began to consider having Lawton turned in for the shooting of his friend.

A commotion broke Bruce out of his thoughts. He had missed the question asked, but something had infuriated Harvey.

“I should have clarified: I'll be answering _relevant_ questions!” Harvey snapped. “The hell is the matter with you? What do my death threats and my wife have to do with any of this? Were you even paying attention?”

“It's my job, Mr. Dent, and it's your job to answer our questions!” the reporter retorted. “ _Can you_ explain why your wife hasn't been seen in public since—”

“No, I'm not gonna stand here and give you a sound bite for your goddamn trashy website, you goddamn moron!” Dent shouted, his face flushed with fury. “The hell is the matter with you?”

Bruce rushed through the crowd. Dent had climbed down the steps and was about to physically attack the reporter. The reporter was still shouting at him and persisting with the question. Bruce reached Harvey just in time to grab his arm in mid-punch. He put his other hand on Harvey's chest and pulled him back.

“Hey, Harvey, calm down.”

Harvey turned on Bruce, looking ready to strike _him_. Recognition registered in his stormy dark blue eyes then, and he calmed. He turned to the crowd and snapped, “No more questions at this time.”

Bruce kept a hand on Harvey's back as he led him up the stairs and into City Hall. The commotion on the street was shut out, and the sudden quiet of the fine lobby blanketed the two men. Bruce released Harvey, who ran his hands through his hair and exhaled. He rubbed his face. There were dark circles beneath his eyes.

“Are you all right?” Bruce asked.

“Yeah. Yeah, I'm … fine, Bruce,” Harvey said, not sounding very fine. “Those jerks are just so damned obnoxious sometimes. Everything is always about a person's family, their relationships, or the dumbest sordid details of their life. The press doesn't care about how this town is run, just about how messed up the ones running it are. But if I was dirty, they wouldn't even blink an eye at that. They'd respect me, in fact, they wouldn't feel like they have to tear me down.”

Harvey opened the doors an inch and looked out. The press was still around, and approached the steps at the sight of him. He quickly shut the doors again.

“Why don't we go out the back and walk to get some coffee?” Bruce suggested. “You look exhausted.”

“That bad, huh?” Harvey said, amused. “Sure. That sounds good.”

They walked through the sedate building until they exited onto the street behind it. They walked down the city streets together, towards the nearby District Attorney's office. Harvey was frowning very deeply, lost in thought.

“How do you do it?”

“Do what?”

Harvey waved a hand vaguely.

“Keep your privacy from the press. I mean, you've been back in town for _two years_ and the press doesn't even know that you're—” He made an all-encompassing gesture. “—you know.”

“I don't know.” Bruce watched the man's face carefully. “What am I, Harvey?”

“You're going to make me say it, aren't you?” Harvey said, reading the look in Bruce's eyes. “What is the proper term for it now? Homosexual? Or just 'gay'? I can never keep what's PC at any given time straight.”

“ 'Gay' is fine,” Bruce said. “So, you could tell. Jim told me that you probably could. _He_ apparently could tell, I never told him about it.”

“Jim's a cop, and I've learned to think like one and study all the details,” Harvey said. “But the press is usually more adept at sniffing out anything they can make into some kind of headline. How the hell have you kept the people you date a secret?”

“Part of it has been deflection,” Bruce said. “I have a lot of female friends, and the press automatically assumes any one of them I'm photographed with is a date. I stayed predominantly alone when I was a kid, and I left the city very early on in my adulthood. I have been back for two years, but … I haven't had a serious relationship yet. I haven't had any reason to come out, the press has no reason to think that I'm gay, and it will probably stay that way.”

“You don't plan to get serious with anyone?”

“I'm very busy, and I've recently come out of something …. It wasn't serious in a realistic sense, but it was painful,” Bruce said. “I don't think I'm ready to trust myself in a relationship again.”

“Maybe you're better off,” Harvey said bitterly. “You don't have to deal with the judgment of the press, and most serious relationships are just an interlude between loneliness and disappointment.”

They entered a small coffee shop, mostly empty in these before-noon hours. Harvey ordered a large coffee with one cream and one sugar, a bagel, and he grabbed a muffin on his way to the table. Bruce took a black coffee. They sat at one of the private booths towards the back of the shop.

“An interlude between loneliness and disappointment,” Bruce repeated over his coffee. “That's pretty cynical.”

“I know,” Harvey said, chewing a bite of muffin contemplatively. “I guess the reason I got so mad at that idiot's question about Gilda was that I couldn't answer it honestly without confirming all the rumors. Not the divorce rumors, but … We're having problems, Bruce. A lot of problems.”

“Do you want to talk about it? Privately, of course.”

“Heh. God, that scene is going to make the evening news, isn't it?” Harvey said. “All the pundit shows and the fake political parody shows are going to have a field day. They know my temper and they just love to exploit it. 'The Angry Apollo'— they called me that once, do you believe it?”

Bruce gave him a look, knowing that Harvey was shooting off his mouth to avoid discussing anything more serious. Harvey could tell that Bruce was not buying it. He was the shrewdest billionaire the District Attorney had ever met.

“I shouldn't burden you with all this crap,” Harvey said self-consciously. “I can't bring it to Jim 'cause he's got his own problems, though, and Gilda and I hardly talk about anything heavy anymore. We have enough to deal with without my complaining to her and scaring her even more.”

“I don't mind it,” Bruce said. “I hope you don't think that just because I'm gay, this is more than it seems.”

An odd look came across Harvey's face, and he paused to take another bite of muffin and sip of coffee.

“Bruce, I wouldn't care if it was,” Harvey finally said. “I've seen the way you look at me. I know you find me attractive. I was bi-curious in college. I don't mind men having interest in me.”

“All right,” Bruce said. He mentally chided himself for the surge of hope the revelation gave him. “But Harvey, I wouldn't disrespect your marriage. We _can_ be only friends.”

“Sure, sure,” Harvey said, staring into his coffee. He took a drink. The bagel arrived, and he busied himself eating that for a few minutes. He had not eaten breakfast that morning, and was starving.

“You should take care of yourself, Harvey,” Bruce said quietly. “Going on caffeine and no food or sleep doesn't work.”

“Gilda used to take care of me,” Harvey said. “We always took care of each other, but lately I have to spend all my time at home taking care of her. I have to be strong for her, to comfort her fears, and it's exhausting. It's selfish, but it's driving me crazy.”

“Can't you tell her how you feel?”

“Tell her what?” Harvey asked hopelessly. “That I'm just as afraid as she is? What good would that do, telling her that I don't even know _how_ to protect us? What can I say? Tell her that I can't stand the way she worries, because she's making _me_ worry even more than I do? It's easy to be brave when it's just you, but when you have someone that you love depending on you, being put in danger because of you, it's not so easy. I never thought about it before, but if I had … I might not have done it.”

“Gotten married?”

“Fallen in love. College and law school were all games: a few guys, a lot of women, nothing ever serious. I didn't have to decide on anything, didn't have to be the one thing or the other.” Harvey made that half full, half empty gesture. “I was free. My career as a prosecutor came in, and I was told very early on that I should take it all the way to the DA's office. So, I had to be a prosecutor and a politician. I met Gilda and we fell in love: the old-fashioned, settle down and have kids kind of love. It was all great, being a husband on top of everything else. But now it feels like I'm busy wearing all these hats and I have nowhere to go to just be … Harvey Dent, whoever that is.”

“Maybe you're putting too much pressure on yourself, Harvey,” Bruce said. “I'm sure your friends and your wife would never think less of you for your fears. It isn't a weakness to be human.”

“I can't,” Harvey said. “If I go around telling everyone how scared I am, it would become more real, you know? I would be … Look, Bruce, I told you about my father, didn't I?”

“Yes. You did.”

“Well, I was scared back then, I was a scared, sniveling child,” Harvey said. “I can't go back to that, Bruce.”

“You're telling me about it.”

“We don't know each other very well,” Harvey pointed out. “We don't run in the same circles. We don't work together. If I ever finish embarrassing the hell out of myself with all this rambling, it would be easy enough to never see your face again.”

“I'm glad you find me to be so conveniently disposable,” Bruce said dryly.

“Yeah, well.” Harvey waved a hand. He spoke with his hands a lot, most likely a habit picked up in court. There was an arrogance in the gestures, something patronizing. “Anyway, I don't know, you seem different. You're a good listener. And even though I can hardly believe it, you don't seem to be judging me.”

“One of the benefits of growing up a Wayne was constant judgment,” Bruce said. “Not from my parents so much, but everyone else: teachers, other students, friends' parents, the press, the world. After my parents were murdered, it was worse. I would never judge you, Harvey. You shouldn't judge yourself so harshly.”

“Old habits,” Harvey said. “But like I said, if I started letting myself fall apart, it wouldn't stop. I need to keep it together. I feel stronger when I act stronger, self-fulfilling prophecy and all that. But that act is driving Gilda and I further and further apart. She can't do it, she can't pretend to be strong, she can't stamp the fear down. She isn't weak, she's just … overwhelmed. I described the realities of my career to her, but no one ever knows their limits until they're pushed to them. This, being too afraid to even think of having kids, facing hatred and death threats every day, it's her limit. We've gone past her limits. But what can she do? She's my wife, she can only turn to me. I hate to say it, but I hate seeing her like that. There's this part of me that … that feels disgust. Christ, Bruce, I know how cruel that sounds. I hate myself for it. It reminds me of my father. But there it is.”

“Everyone has a dark side,” Bruce reasoned.

“There's no excuse for it,” Harvey said. “You know it, and I know it.”

“Fine,” Bruce said. “If you've gotten to the point where you're not only miserable but feeling contempt for the person you love, you need to talk to her. It might be hard for both of you, but nothing will feel worse than this.”

Harvey had managed to finish his bagel between all the talking. He pushed crumbs around the plate idly, and drank more coffee. He motioned for one of the servers for a refill and handed over his cup.

“Maybe you're right, Bruce,” Harvey said. “I don't know. I've forgotten how to _be_ the one that needs help, the one that needs to be protected. No one ever protected me. My father used to say that life won't ever protect you, it's the good and the bad at random, so you'd better be strong enough for anything.”

“That isn't true,” Bruce said. “You fight for a system, you will it to work. Your choices and actions define your life. It isn't random.”

“Random's not always bad,” Harvey said. “We bumped into each other randomly at the Ball in Blue. And now we're … havin' coffee. It's all down to the luck.”

“It wasn't random,” Bruce said. “I donated to your campaign, remember? I voted for you. I was bound to want to meet the real Harvey Dent.”

“Careful what you wish for,” Harvey said with a rueful laugh. “I should have put warnings on all those campaign ads: 'not as advertised'.”

“You're doing the best that you can,” Bruce said. “I still believe in Harvey Dent.”

Harvey laughed, and his mood shifted. He got his second coffee, and asked for another bagel to go with it. He had not had a chance to sit and talk and eat this freely in a while.

“I'll never hear the end of that damn slogan,” Harvey said. “Politics, Bruce, never get into politics. Everyone knows it's a game of lies, but people love playing it, love watching it. It's like those new underground sports rings where enhancements and drugs are embraced: the best cheater wins.”

“The Augment Arenas, I've heard of those,” Bruce said. “You're right, politics are exactly like that. I hear the Augment Arenas are being considered for legalization.”

“Nothing's real, but everyone just has fun playing along,” Harvey said. “Well, what can you do? All the convictions I've got are real. If I can take down the big fish in this town, the threats will lessen, and the press will have to shut up. My luck will turn. I'll _make_ it turn.”

“Big fish?”

“The mob,” Harvey explained. “Jim and I are working to take down the two biggest crime families in Gotham: the Maroni family and the Falcone organization AKA 'The Roman Empire'. This Batman character seems to be cleaning up the freak shows, so we have some room to build our cases against them. That was the plan, anyway. These guys are Teflon, though. We haven't managed to bust anyone higher up than the usual enforcers and goons.”

 _It might be time for Batman to help Gordon and Harvey out with criminals of the non-freak show variety,_ Bruce thought. _I could use a break from masked psychopaths, and I doubt I'd ever be inclined to fall in love with a mob boss._

_Then again, I never expected to fall in love with a sniper, either._

“Most of the threats are coming from those two families,” Harvey said. “The serious threats, the ones that have Gilda imagining—Never mind what she imagines. She's read enough about revenge murders online to fill a lifetime of nightmares. I'm new, untested, these guys are pushing me, and they'll keep pushing until I break or break them. I need to get the bosses, lieutenants. Maybe then Gilda and I will have some peace.”

Bruce nodded.

“I won't tell you about things getting better. We're both too worldly to put any stock in that cliché. But things can change, and sometimes that's enough.”

“You're right about that,” Harvey said. He downed the last of his second cup of coffee. His hands trembled slightly from the caffeine when he set the cup down, but he felt better with the food. “But things won't change if I waste time like this. I'm sorry, Bruce, but I really have to go. I was supposed to be back at the DA's office after the press conference, and I have court later.”

“I understand,” Bruce said. They both stood, and he removed a card from his pocket and wrote on the back of it. “If you ever need to talk, call me. This is my personal cell.”

“Thanks, but I'm all talked out for a while,” Harvey said, though he put the card in his jacket's inner breast pocket. “Back to action, right?”

“Unfortunately, yes,” Bruce said. “I have to stop at the company.”

“Ah yeah, 'the' company,” Harvey said. He cocked his head, looking up at Bruce. “Sometimes I forget you're Bruce Wayne, prince of Gotham, owner of Wayne Enterprises, WayneTech, and WayneEverythingElse.”

“And sometimes I forget that you have a tendency to mouth off to anyone raised on a trust fund.”

Harvey smirked, walking backwards away from Bruce. “Who said being part of the one percent can't be a bitch sometimes?”

Bruce shook his head, giving him a wave.

“Good day, Mr. District Attorney.”

Harvey gave a salute-like wave, turned, and left the coffee shop. Bruce realized he had not paid for his second bagel, and left money for both of them on the table. He mused over how one never knew how lonely they were until they fell into company they enjoyed. Bruce now saw that he was very, very lonely.


	7. New Enemies

[November 24, 2014, Gotham City]

By nightfall, Batman knew what he would have to do. It was a risk, but he had several back-up strategies prepared and in place. He hated cutting it so close to the assassination, but there was nothing to be done about that. He began to think that working alone was not the best way to clean up the city. Too late for regrets. The CIA plane carrying Kassan Shadid was scheduled to land at 10:30 PM, slipped into a private hangar at Gotham International under the cover of night.

[8:00 PM]

Bobby Halloran was furious. He had spent the day in a bar, then hit the early opening of a new club downtown. The club had turned out to be a disaster, the crowd completely lame and oddly unattractive: the unpopular kids just out of prep school, Bobby thought. Trust funds could not guarantee pretty, fun, interesting people. Bobby had only stayed inside over an hour to get drunk enough to brave another place.

In truth, Bobby was in no mood for partying. The scene with his father the previous day was still on his mind, and he was in a defiant mood. He took to the freeway and climbed the blue Benz's speed up to the limit—then surpassed it. He turned off the freeway and kept to roughly the same speed.

There was a sound like a gunshot, and the squeal of rubber, then metal. The car began to lose speed. Bobby hit the steering wheel angrily. A blowout? In this slum? The General was going to kill him if he had compromised another car.

Bobby pulled over to the curb and got out of the car to assess the damage. He had not taken more than three wobbling steps before he was grabbed by the front of his shirt.

“Whoa! Whoa! Hey! Hey, look, man, you don't want to do this!” Bobby shouted as he was dragged down the street. “Listen, take the car, I've got money, this can be really easy for y—”

“Shut up.”

The cool, soft voice made Bobby's head snap up. He looked up into a demon's face: sharp pointy ears, cold blue eyes, a massive figure cloaked in blackness. Bobby's racing heart skipped a few beats, and his breath stopped inside his lungs. He thought that he must have fallen asleep at the wheel, died, and gone to hell. Or maybe it was only a nightmare, that wouldn't be so bad.

“You're the Batman!” Bobby gasped. “Wh-what the hell? I thought you only went after criminals!”

“You're a criminal, Bobby,” Batman told him. He slammed him back against the hood of his father's car, leaning his face close. “Do you know how many people are killed by drunk drivers? You've been consistently arrested for DUI ever since you turned seventeen.”

“Hey-hey-hey-hey! Okay! Look, I'll-I'll call my driver, all right?” Bobby stammered, his large eyes even rounder with fear. “I won't drive drunk anymore. Okay?”

Batman squinted down at him. “Do you think I'll accept your excuses as easily as your father does, Bobby?”

“I—” Bobby's voice hit a high pitch that he did not think he was capable of. His mouth moved wordlessly a few times, and then he swallowed. “Please don't break my arm or-or my face. Please? I … I don't know what to tell you. I'm sorry. Do you care about money? I have money, I have a lot of money.”

For a moment, Bruce Wayne, buried somewhere within Batman, felt a streak of anger towards his old friend. Now he knew how Bobby had gotten away with having so many DUIs on his record and still having a license.

“Hey, what are you doing? What are you _doing_?”

Batman turned Bobby over, and flipped him over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. He got a firm grasp on him, annoyed by the younger man's limbs flailing, and shot his grappling hook up to the highest ledge possible.

“HEY! You can't just take me! This is—This is kidnapping! Put me down! Oh shiii—”

Bobby had to shut up as he was whisked through the air. Nausea rippled through him, and he swallowed hard to keep the vomit down. He did not want to know what would happen if he threw up on Batman's cape. Once he stifled the nausea, he began pounding on Batman's shoulders.

“You can't just fly through the city with me like this!”

Batman, who was not flying but using his grappling hook, gritted his teeth. Bruce was tempted to make a retort, but Batman could not. The duality of his life was hitting him like a freight train recently.

“Did you hear me?” Bobby asked. “Do you know who my father is? General Walter Halloran! He's had dinner with the President! He'll bring the entire United States military down on you! They'll hunt you down! He won't stand for this!”

“Be quiet.”

“No! No, I won't just shut up! I won't!” Bobby shouted, his defiant mood rekindled. He continued pounding on Batman's shoulders, despite the padding, and kicking at his chest. “If you don't put me down, I swear to God, I'll have my father destroy you!”

Bruce repressed a sigh. He gave the struggling man a sharp smack on the bottom. “I said, _be quiet_.”

“You can't just hit me!” Bobby exclaimed, shocked. He struggled harder. “You can't!”

“I can.” Batman stopped on a rooftop to give the young man a few more spanks. “I will.”

The struggling stopped. Batman swung down from the top and they were on the way again.

“Where are you taking me?” a very sullen Robert Halloran asked. He stared wide-eyed at the city flying by below. They were swinging from roof ledge to roof ledge as easily as cartoon primates swung on vines.

“To see your father.”

“Why?” Bobby asked, perplexed. “He knows I do things like this. What is he going to do?”

“It isn't about what you've done,” Batman said quietly. “It's what he's going to do.”

“Dad? What do you mean? What is he doing?” Bobby asked. “He's perfect, right? You can't have a problem with him. He's a goddamn American hero.”

Batman shut his mouth, and did not say a word more. Bobby tried to get another reaction from him, but he was simply carried through the city. The vertigo, drunkenness, and loss of adrenaline finally made him pass out.

[8:25 PM]

General Walter Halloran was on edge. He was outwardly calm and rigidly controlled, but he felt the slight speed of his pulse and the subtle twist of his gut that always signified an important operation going down. Deadshot had gone dark after the encounter with Batman the previous night: phoned to tell Halloran that the price of the contract had doubled due to his hands being broken, but not to worry because he could still make the shot. Halloran had no idea how Deadshot intended to make the shot without working fingers, but he did not doubt Lawton.

 _Then why am I so damned nervous?_ Walter thought angrily. He paced his home office, smoking the damned cigars that had doomed him to cancer. He felt odd, being out of uniform and overseeing an op, as if he were making a speech naked. This should not be an unauthorized operation. He should be in an Operations Center directing a team of men, or in a tent on the ass-end of the desert brainstorming about how to take these damned terrorists out, not having to resort to going behind his country's back just to put a neat little bow on its own sworn enemies. Shadid and his family never should be allowed to set foot on US soil.

The door to the office burst open with a boom. Halloran instantly dropped to a crouch, opened the bottom drawer of his desk, and removed his personal pistol. He took cover behind the desk, and risked a peek around the corner of it.

Batman slammed down on top of the desk. Halloran raised his gun, but his wrist was grabbed before he could aim. The older man was still strong and sharply trained. He pulled into the tug instead of fighting it, then twisted and brought his free fist up into an uppercut: he had seen that Batman's mask did not cover his lower face. His fist connected with the front of the man's chin, and it hit flesh hard. Batman's grip on his arm did not even waver: whatever or whoever he was, he could take a hit. Halloran jumped up onto the desk beside Batman, and threw himself over the opposite side of it. The angle was impossible for Batman to maintain without the tension disjointing his arm, and so he released him. Halloran rolled across the office floor, crouched again, and took aim. Batman was out of sight. It was a spacious office, but where had he gone?

 _Behind me,_ Walter realized. He crab-walked very fast across the room, and aimed at the door.

“I don't know why you're here!” Halloran shouted. “I don't care what reason you have for this attack! You're finished! Do you hear me? You're through!”

“So are you.”

Had Batman gotten outside the office? Halloran stood and walked backwards, the gun aimed firmly at the door. Cigar smoke whirled, and he cursed himself for having impaired his vision. Bobby had been right about the smoking.

“I don't know what you're talking about!” Halloran shouted out. He needed intel, and right away. No one in Gotham had any information regarding the Batman, not even a probable identity. It was imperative to know the enemy's mindset and intent before engaging, if possible.

“The hit on Shadid.”

The voice seemed to come from directly behind the door. Halloran emptied his chamber firing from the middle of the door to the bottom and top, then across. He clicked out the empty magazine and was about to click in a new one, when the door was kicked open again. Something cut through the smoke like a knife and struck the gun, knocking it from Halloran's hand. A slice of pain stabbed the side of his hand, and he grabbed it on instinct.

Batman burst through the door again, and he loomed on Halloran before he had a chance to go for his gun again. He took him by the front of his suit jacket and slammed him into one of the gargantuan bookshelves against the wall. Books spilled out, and the smell of old leather and paper briefly wafted between the two men.

“I know you can communicate with Deadshot,” Batman said. “You're going to call him and tell him that you're canceling the contract on Kassan Shadid.”

“And why the hell would I do that?”

Batman threw Halloran across the room, so that he faced the door.

“So that your son doesn't remember you as a terrorist.”

“What do you know about—” Walter looked up after stumbling and his eyes widened. “Bobby!”

Bobby had entered the room, and he stood gaping in the doorway. His dark brown hair was all on end and his suit was disheveled from the trip across the city. Still, for once, he looked neater than the General.

“Dad?” Bobby asked, his voice unsteady. “It's true? Everything Batman told me about this-this _assassination_ is true? You set all this up? A _murder_?”

Walter straightened up, smoothing down his clothes. Despite his straight spine and hard expression, there was true concern and fear in his eyes. He forgot about Batman, who lingered nearby.

“This is political, son,” Walter said. “You wouldn't understand it.”

“Don't you dare—Don't you _**dare**_ patronize me right now!” Bobby shouted, more forceful than either Bruce of Walter had ever heard him be before. “I might not be much of what you consider to be a man, but I am _not_ a child! I understand that you're a soldier, and that being a soldier means loyalty and discipline! How could I not understand that when you drilled it into me every single day of my childhood? I understand that if the country can't trust its soldiers to follow orders in peace and war, the entire system falls apart! And I _understand_ that this is a direct violation of our country's policy, total disrespect of the very institutions you've been so proud of defending all these years!”

Walter blinked, shocked by his son's intensity. It was a side of him Walter had long since given up hoping was there. Suddenly, he saw quite clearly the man his little boy might grow into yet.

“This is treason, dad,” Bobby said softly. “How can you even consider doing something like this? Why would you throw everything you care about away?”

“My career isn't everything I care about.”

Walter tried to put a hand on Bobby's shoulder, but Bobby hit his hand away. He moved away from his father.

“If you cared anything about me, you wouldn't be doing this,” Bobby said. “Even if no one would ever find out, even if you got away with it, how could I live with myself? How could I live with _you_ being this … Dad, my God! We've had our differences, but if I ever had anything, I had faith in you! I was proud of you, dad.”

“Bobby, I'm doing this for my country,” Walter said. “I'm doing what I've always done, fighting for—”

“No! You're fighting for yourself!” Bobby snapped. “Batman told me the truth, all of it! You want to leave some big legacy behind, however it turns out! You're dying and you feel like you're irrelevant, like you're leaving behind just—just a stupid, pointless kid. I'm sorry I couldn't be your big legacy, dad, but this … this can't be it, either.”

“Son—”

“No! Don't call me that!” Bobby said. His face softened, and he shook his head. “Don't call me that. If you don't call this off, we're done. I don't care if you're dying, if you don't stop this, I'll never speak to you again. I'll never see you again.”

“Robert, please let me explain this,” Walter said. He managed to get his hands on his son's shoulders. “I can't end this right now, so please try to understand why I'm doing this.”

“No,” Bobby said stubbornly. “No. I don't want to understand this insanity. Dad, please, can't you just call this off? Please? We'll … I'll help you through chemotherapy. I promise. You'll beat it. You've always beaten everything. You're so strong … You're the strongest person I know, dad. We'll beat it together. And you'll go to Washington, D.C. and you'll organize real change, if you want to. You'll do what you've always done and take charge. You don't need to use some hired gun for some conspiracy plot. You're too good for that.”

“There isn't much time, General Halloran,” Batman interjected. “I need an answer. _Now_.”

“How dare you!” Walter growled, turning to Batman. “You use my son, my _only child_ , to try and force my hand? What kind of monster are you?”

“What kind of monster _are you_?” Bobby asked Walter quietly.

Walter looked at his son, startled. He paced, scrubbing both hands through his close-cropped iron gray hair. He sat on the edge of his desk, and looked over at Bobby with a searching, sorrowful look.

“Fine.” Walter reached into his suit's inner breast pocket and removed his phone. “Deadshot has been dark, but he always carries a small pager for use by the client should they want the contract canceled. I'll send him the code. It'll stop him.”

“Thank you, dad,” Bobby said. He walked over to his father, went to put a hand on him, then stopped himself. “Thank you.”

Walter stood and embraced Bobby, shocking the young man. He glared at Batman over the man's shoulder. It was evident that their business was far from over.

Walter's phone rang, and he answered it.

“ _Hey there, General. Did I read that code right?”_ Lawton drawled through the phone. _“You get cold feet?”_

“It's over, Deadshot,” Walter said. “I suggest you get the hell out of Gotham.”

“ _Tch. I thought this might happen. Did that overgrown flying rodent get to you, too? You do realize I'm keeping the security deposit? For my efforts, you could say.”_

“Then keep it!” Walter snapped. “Look, Batman is here. I won't give you up to him, but you'd better go. You—”

“That's enough,” Batman said, taking the phone. He cut the call short, and handed it back to Walter. “I'll find him, General.”

“I hope you find one of his bullets,” muttered Walter. He still had an arm around Bobby. He held the boy to his shoulder closely for a long moment. “Just get out of my house.”

Batman followed his advice.

[11:22 PM]

Batman watched the arrival and processing of Shadid. Nothing untoward happened. He then searched the city for any trace of Deadshot, but the man had vanished. He knew that by this time, he was probably long gone from Gotham City. Nonetheless, he lastly went to Lawton's room at the Gotham Regal.

Everything but the rubble of Lawton's sloppy little stay was cleared out. Batman was just leaving when he noticed an envelope on the bed. He went to it and picked it up. _Bruce Wayne,_ was inscribed on the front, in a surprisingly even, neat hand. It must have been written before Lawton's hands had been broken last night. Batman opened the envelope and removed the note inside.

 _'Hey Bruce,'_ the note read, _'if you're reading this, I'm long gone from Gotham, however my business here might have turned out. If someone other than Bruce Wayne is reading this, if you're not a complete asshole, send it along. Or throw it out. And fuck you._

_'Bruce, I just wanted to tell you that we had a good time. I wanted to thank you for that, and for six years ago. I don't know if I could tell you this out loud, probably not, but I had to get it down here now: I can't say that I love you, but I will say that I **could have** loved you. If I weren't so screwed up, if we weren't so different, whatever … in an alternate reality … I could have loved you. It would have been easy and natural. It would have healed me. I would never have deserved it—you—but I would have taken everything I could get from you, and more. You would have been the only person I had ever loved. You would have been every sappy love song and cliché in the book. _

_'This is the last time you'll ever get an apology from me, so here it is: I'm sorry for ruining all we would have had, Bruce. I'm sorry.'_

Batman folded the note and put it in one of the boxes on his belt. He knew Bruce Wayne would want to keep it.

[11: 44 PM]

Harvey Bullock was up late that night, eyes glued to the news channel. He waited for word on Shadid, but as far as he could tell, whatever plans Halloran had for him were canceled. He wondered if the General would want his money back. If he did, he could shove it: that money was for a specific kind of ignorance, and Bullock had played his part. If they had not needed his assistance, that was their fault, it had nothing to do with the financial transaction.

Suddenly, a great weight wrapped around his neck. Bullock started, reaching for his gun, but it was not in its usual place at the side of his recliner. The weight grew heavier, choking off his breath, and he was pulled far back in the chair. His eyes lifted, and he saw a great figure all in black.

“The hit on Shadid didn't go off, no thanks to you,” a low, menacing voice informed him. “Don't think that you're going to keep General Halloran's money. You're such a nice person that you've just donated it all to the children's hospital.”

“WHAT!” Bullock rumbled, struggling to break the Batman's iron hold. “What the hell did you do? You can't do that!”

“I did,” Batman said. He tightened his arm around the man's thick neck to shut him up. “Gordon and Harvey Dent don't trust you, but they work with you. It's because of them that I'm going to give you one chance. You stay out of my way, and you keep that chance. You say one word against me, you take one more bribe, and you lose it. You lose your job, your retirement, your freedom, everything.”

“Okay, all right,” Bullock managed, sounding strangled. “Just get the hell off of—”

All the pressure was suddenly gone.

“—me .”

Bullock blinked, and jumped to his feet. He looked around wildly for his gun, found it thrown across the room, and grabbed it. He clicked the safety off and ran for the window. Outside, the city bustled by through the falling snow, and Batman was lost in the shadows.

“Goddamn freak,” Bullock seethed. “Damn it!”


	8. Gotham In Winter

[November 30, 2014]

The Frost Parade was an annual tradition in Gotham City. The first Sunday after Thanksgiving hosted a massive procession down the streets of Gotham from three-o-clock in the afternoon until six in the evening. At this point, Robinson Park hosted a park-wide party known as the Frost Ball, one of the last events in the city where rich and poor, young and old all mingled seamlessly (thanks to the efforts of most of Gotham City PD's officers). The height of the Frost Ball came at nine-o-clock, when the giant evergreen brought in to stand in the center of the park was lit, ushering in the Christmas season.

The police station was in chaos that morning, as everyone prepared to mobilize out to the parade grounds and the park.

“This is a waste of time,” Harvey Dent scowled over his coffee. He was following Gordon through the station, the coffee cup in one hand and an annoyingly sticky doughnut in the other. “I hate events like this. They just bog everything down with a million minor cases, while the important investigations get put on hold.”

“Because of course, you would never consider actually taking a single day as a holiday,” Gordon said dryly. “Bring Gilda out. Relax. Have fun. Stop being the District Attorney for two seconds. Can you do that?”

“No, I can't,” Harvey said through a mouthful of doughnut. “And Gilda? Are you kidding me? The woman's afraid of her own shadow, she can't come out in these crowds! No, she's not coming, and I'm not going to enjoy a second of this. I just want to get it over with.”

“So do I, to be honest,” Gordon admitted. “I am going to try to spend five minutes with my family, though. You can't go on like this, Harvey. You need something to ease the stress.”

“I _know_ ,” Harvey said irritably. He thought of Bruce's card, which he had transferred to and kept inside his wallet. “ … I know.”

They passed by the stairs, just as Harvey Bullock was going down them. Bullock's rage had been boiling inside him since Batman stole and donated his bribe money. He had been considering several plans of action, and had finally decided on one. He headed down the stairs to the department's IT department, which sat across the the computer lab and down the hall from the server room.

“Has anyone seen him?” Bullock asked the first woman at a cubicle he found.

“Himself is in the server room,” the young lady with Goth make-up replied. She rolled her eyes. “He _always_ works in there on his two laptops and tablet. Says the sound of all the mouth-breathing in here disturbs him.”

“Yeah, that sounds like him,” Bullock muttered.

Bullock stormed out of the IT department and headed for the server room. The low buzz of running machines vibrated in the air, resonating around and _through_ him. The room was spotlessly clean, white walls and floors bright in the fluorescent glow. The large black servers were lined up in several long rows, tiny blue and green and orange lights winking like Christmas lights. They were top of the line, a donation from WayneTech Bruce gave when he returned to Gotham two years ago.

There was a break in the rows in the center of the room, leaving a ten-foot by ten-foot square section of floor clear. A solitary figure sat in this space, two laptops set beside him, a tablet in his hand. A trash can had been added to this spot in the server room, filled with candy bar wrappers, empty juice boxes, soda cans, and water bottles. There was a stack of old newspapers piled neatly beside the trash can.

“Hey. Hey! Nashton!”

“I heard you the first time,” the man said. He lifted his head, pushing coppery red hair off of his face. His glasses had slid down the thin bridge of his nose, and he pushed them back up, covering the glint of cool green eyes. “There's no need to over-tax your vocal cords.”

The large old detective glared down at the thinner, younger head of the IT department. He ground his teeth, hating to have to deal with the smug self-proclaimed genius, Edward Nashton.

“Do you need something?” Edward asked. “I see that you didn't come down here to bring me the morning paper.”

“I thought all the techies got their news from those things,” Bullock said, nodding at the tablet Edward still held. “What do you need the paper for?”

“I like the crossword puzzles,” Edward said. He tapped the tablet's glass screen. “It really isn't the same without the inky tree pulp.”

“Inky tree pulp. Sure.”

Edward got to his feet. He was pale and thin, but actually quite tall. Unlike the rest of the civilian IT team, he did not wear casual clothing (or worse, Bullock thought in regard to the Goth girl's outfit). He had removed his dark emerald suit jacket, but wore black slacks and a crisp black shirt. His sleeves were rolled up, purple tie loosened, but his clothing were pressed and neat. He did not seem bothered by the server room's perpetual chill.

“I asked you a question,” Edward said. “If there's anything I hate, it's an unanswered question. So, I repeat: _what_ do you _want_?”

“Actually, the reason I'm here _is_ an unanswered question,” Bullock said. “You're a pretty smart guy—”

“Apes are 'pretty smart',” Edward interrupted. “ _I_ am the smartest man in Gotham.”

Bullock stifled the urge to take the smartest man in Gotham by his skinny neck and throttle him.

“Okay,” he said tightly, “then I guess this mystery shouldn't be a problem.”

“Ooh, a mystery.” Edward laughed, leaning back against the corner of one of the servers. “Go on, detective, don't build the suspense. Ask me the question.”

“Sure thing.” Bullock met Edward's eyes directly. “Who is Batman?”

Edward's smile widened into a grin. He looked as pleased as a man who had won a free lap dance at a strip joint, Bullock thought. It was decidedly creepy.

“Answer that question, and you'll get the cash prize,” Bullock said. “Ten thousand dollars if you can prove the identity of the Batman beyond the shadow of a doubt.”

“Ha ha ha _ha_! Oh, do I love this,” Edward said. “But tell me, detective, why now?”

“Because that bastard has me under his thumb, and I don't work on a leash,” Bullock said. “Never mind my reasons. Will you answer me that question? _Can_ you figure it out, smartest man in Gotham?”

“Of course I can,” Edward said cheerfully. “And I'll be happy to take your money. I assume you'd prefer this stay under the collective radars of Dent and Gordon?”

“You assume right.”

“Assume correctly,” Edward corrected. He paced in long strides of his long legs, rubbing his thin bottom lip with a finger. “I wonder if this has anything to do with the following events: the non-fatal shooting of Commissioner Gordon just days before he was scheduled to coordinate security efforts regarding Kassan Shadid's arrival, your meeting with General Walter Halloran just a day after that, the admittance of Floyd Lawton AKA 'Deadshot' to Gotham General Hospital with two broken hands, and the surprisingly smooth arrival of Mr. Shadid himself.”

Bullock's jaw actually dropped. The toothpick from his breakfast sandwich, lodged in his teeth since, fell out and clattered on the floor.

“Scenario: a disgruntled General arranges for an assassin to take out Mr. Shadid upon his arrival in good, old 'merica, thus inciting a zero sum war,” Edward said. “Problem: Jim Gordon is not a man to be paid off, and he will have every possible sniper's nest within range of the airport secured. Solution: have the assassin injure Gordon to get him out of play, then pay off the next man put in charge, which would be you. Ah, but then … Batman enters the equation! He takes the assassin out of play. Mr. Shadid comes and goes, no harm, no foul, and no international incident.”

“How the hell … can you possibly … _possibly_ know all of that?” Bullock asked, too stunned to even be angry.

“The timing of Gordon's shooting made it fairly obvious that it was related to Shadid's arrival, and Gordon asked me to find a potential threat to Shadid's life,” Edward said. Though he was in charge of the GCPD's systems and the security of those systems, he was also trying to get a secondary position as the head of a cyber-crimes unit, which as of yet did not exist. Gordon sometimes used his offered help in solving cases, and paid him extra for his work. “I searched the dark net for a list of probable snipers that could have made the shot on him, and narrowed it down to five assassins. I tracked the identities of these men and looked into their bank accounts: Lawton, AKA 'Deadshot', had recently received a very large payment wired to his offshore account. I couldn't track who had sent the payment, but then your meeting with Halloran was caught on CCTV footage that I was reviewing for another case. It wasn't very difficult to figure out the rest of the matter from that.”

“Those records, those files—That's illegal hacking.”

“It _is?_ ” Edward gasped in false shock. He smirked again, and shrugged. “Question: if nobody knows just how much you know, do you really know it at all?”

Bullock rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Can you stop the questions and just speak like a normal person, Nashton? Please.”

“Gordon _knows_ I hack,” Edward said, speaking in slow, deliberate tones. “No one _knows_ that Gordon _knows_ that I use illegal means of accessing information. I'm an unofficial consultant. Like your nemesis Batman, in a way.”

“You're nothin' like the Bat, trust me,” Bullock said flatly. “Well, if you're in the _know_ , then this shouldn't be a problem for you. Name the Bat, prove it, and you get your money. And no, I _don't_ want Gordon to know—” Bullock almost put emphasis on the word again, and cursed Edward's silly phrasing. “—about any of this.”

“Your visit down here was fortuitous,” Edward said. “Not only was I bored … I was just about to go up to our newly-returned Commissioner and give all of the information I've gathered.” He tapped the tablet screen. “It's all right here in a nice, _thorough_ report, ready to be sent to Gordon's private email with the tap of a virtual button.”

Bullock paled. “You-you wouldn't.”

“Question: how much is it worth to you to make this little report disappear?” Edward asked smoothly. “And don't think about resorting to primitive violence. I have redundant copies of this report on my private cloud server, and my other machines, all far from your reach and set to be sent to Gordon by midnight tonight. You see, I had already estimated this information's worth, and settled on the most profitable disposal of it.”

“Really,” Bullock said tonelessly. “And what is that _scenario_?”

“I'm so glad you asked,” Edward said. “You now have a problem of your own: how to come up with fifty-thousand dollars to make sure my report disappears into the digital ether. Might I suggest a solution?”

“Fifty-thousand!” Bullock echoed furiously. “You conniving little bastard! You scheming, greedy, pale computer monkey of a bastard!”

“Are you done?” Edward asked, blinking lazily in boredom. “Solution: you go to your new friend General Halloran and explain your problem to him—leaving _my name_ out of it, obviously. Get the money on loan, then give it to me. A secondary solution would be to take some more of those bribes you're wont to accept, and with a little ingenuity and patience, you can save up to buy my silence. You're a resourceful man, I'm sure you can make one of those solutions work.”

Bullock grabbed Edward by the front of his shirt and shook him. He slammed him into one of the servers, hard. Edward's smug smile did not waver.

“I ought to kick your ass, Nashton,” Bullock growled. “You always were a goddamn weirdo!”

“All geniuses are seen as eccentric,” Edward said. “Higher minds work in different patterns, have different perceptions, than—”

Bullock swung his fist, stopping it only an inch from Edward's face. Edward winced, shutting his eyes. When he looked up again, he was no longer smiling. There was anger, fear, and something else in his eyes.

“I will knock you so hard that your 'higher mind' is permanently scrambled,” Bullock said. “Don't think I won't, Nashton.”

“But you _will_ get me my money, regardless? Won't you?”

Bullock threw Edward so hard aside that he was flung to the floor. His shoulder hit the corner of his laptop and he yelped in pain. He crawled back some feet from Bullock, rubbing his shoulder sullenly.

“I'll get you the money,” Bullock said. “If you identify the Batman, I'll even get you that 10k, too. You do anything to screw me in any way, and I will beat the daylights outta you. Then I'll kill you. Are we clear?”

Edward swallowed, the sudden violence drudging up old memories. Before he could stop himself, he meekly said, “Yes. We are … the complete antithesis of opaque.”

“Good.”

Bullock stormed away, trying to remember what the hell 'antithesis' meant. When he was gone, Edward picked up the tablet he had dropped when he was thrown. It was intact, thanks to the green shock-resistant case he had snapped it into. There was no email ready to be sent to Gordon, that had been a bluff, but the report was real enough. Edward had no interest in this, however. He opened a fresh note in his note-taking app, and used a stylus to scrawl his new project's name at the top of the screen:

_?Who IS Batman?_

* * *

Bruce Wayne was not the kind of man to pray. He envied some people their faith at times, but he was unable to believe that an all-powerful deity existed and oversaw all the ugliness in the world without healing it. He did not think any mysterious way could be a justification for allowing a world to burn as children died and no one cared about the sound of suffering.

The idea of spending the entire day and night with the wintry festivities almost made Bruce want to pray just then, however.

“If you remain in the car any longer, sir, you won't need to worry about the day anymore,” Alfred said, looking at Bruce's eyes through the rearview mirror. “Or the night.”

“I know,” Bruce sighed. “This is the last week I want to end with an entire day and night of partying. Someone has to keep an eye out, though. Harvey Dent and Gordon will be doing the same, whether they want to or not. Batman should also be on standby. I have the car with the suit locked down a block away. My phone is wired to this car's GPS. You'll be nearby, won't you?”

“Of course, sir.”

“Thank you, Alfred.”

“It is no trouble at all, sir,” said Alfred. The driving would be very slow, and he had a tablet loaded with episodes of _Murder She Wrote_ , music, and eBooks he had been meaning to read but hadn't been able to. It would be a slow, easy day, and given all the drama recently, he could use precisely that.

“I'm going,” Bruce said, opening the car door. He hesitated.

“Good luck, sir.”

Bruce heard the impatience in the butler's voice, and smiled. “Thank you, Alfred.”

Bruce got out of the car and shut the door. He walked from the quiet backstreet to the main road, where the crowd was already thickly packed together. Excitement was in the air and music was playing through speakers mounted to the lamp posts up and down the street. The air smelled of snow, the universal scent of mingled humans, myriad perfumes and colognes, and fried food, the individual notes of these bouquets rising and falling as Bruce moved through the crowd. Bruce had known better than to arrive too early, and the first parade floats were visible rolling down the street in the distance. Children were squealing in anticipation.

Bruce's phone buzzed in his pocket. He took it out and read a text. Bobby wanted to know if he was here yet and wanted to know where he was. The app was able to access the phone's GPS, and Bruce texted Bobby a location ping which would put his location on Bobby's phone and show their real-time proximity to one another. Within ten minutes, Bobby had made his way to Bruce.

Bobby was with a crowd of friends, all expensively attired and highly attractive. He introduced them all to Bruce one by one. Bruce felt the gilded roots of the society he had been born into wrapping around his ankles, and felt a streak of emotional claustrophobia. He found several of Bobby's crowd to be rather intriguing, however:

“Bruce, Selina Kyle and Thomas Blake. Selina, Tom, meet Bruce Wayne.”

Thomas Blake was a handsome man, his skin tanned golden even in this season though it looked natural: a vacation tan. He was blond, blue-eyed, and had a glint of adventure and mischief in his eyes. The fair stubble on his face gave him a roguish look. Bruce noted that his suit was expensive, clean, and immaculate, but from a year or two ago. The woman was older than Bobby, closer to Bruce's age. She had a cynical amusement in her sparkling green eyes and smile. Out of all the women with the crowd, she was the only one who seemed above youthful, rich immaturity: her golden blond hair was swept up elegantly, her make-up was dramatic but tasteful, she had no nervous gestures or feigned coyness, and her clothing were fashionable but lacking the kitsch of trendy couture. Bruce kissed the back of her hand, and there was a flicker of dry humor in her eyes; she thought Bruce was just another rich boy, like Bobby. Bruce wondered where the beautiful woman had earned her worldly cynicism.

“Nice to meet you, Bruce,” Selina said. She leaned a palm on Tom's chest, though there was no affection in the gesture. “I've heard too much about you.”

“Haven't we all?” Bruce smiled.

Selina caught the same whiff of cynicism in Bruce that he had scented in her. An interesting sign. She kept her eyes on him, though offered nothing in reply but a smile.

“Victor Zsasz.”

Victor kept his hands in his coat pockets, giving Bruce a nod instead of a handshake. He looked distracted, and his light blue eyes were hazy from drugs beneath the lank blond hair that fell into them. He looked like a man staring down darkness and losing.

“Roman Sionis.”

Bruce was stricken by Roman's eyes: they were so dark brown that they looked like cold orbs of ebony. They were dull, cold, dead. His handshake was nearly as hard as his smile. He did not seem to want to be a part of this group, and had the habit of rubbing the side of his face, as if he wanted to rip it right off.

“Anton and Natalia Knight.”

Their facial structure was too different for them to be related by blood, but both Knight siblings were strikingly beautiful and raven-haired. There was a Gothic look to them, enhanced by Natalia's dark make-up and Anton's very pale skin. They were very polite, and Bruce could tell that they were quite close.

“I heard about your father,” Bruce told the Knight siblings. Charles Knight had been murdered a year ago. “My condolences.”

The group all chatted with Bruce in turns. Bobby's habit of babbling about anything he found impressive revealed that: Thomas Blake was an avid big-game hunter and had recently come back from hunting lions in Africa (Selina's left eye twitched at this); Roman Sionis worked at his parent's company, Janus Cosmetics; and Victor Zsasz's parents had recently died in a boating accident.

Bruce held Bobby back when the rest of the group went to the front of the crowd to watch one of the celebrities performing on the passing float. “Chandelier” blared through the speakers, the sound turned up as the float neared.

“How are you, Bobby?”

“Me? Oh, I'm … Well, I'm good,” Bobby said. “I'm sorry for dumping all that crap on you when we met for Thanksgiving. The whole scene with my father and Batman messed me up. Dad and I are actually getting along, though. He's starting chemo soon, and he's letting me support him. It's nice. He needs me for once, instead of the other way around. While he's getting better, I'm even going to work at HalloTech for him.”

“That's great.”

“Yeah, it is.” Bobby was beaming. “It's the best holiday season I've had in a long time. Other than dad's cancer, of course.”

Tom Blake called Bobby over.

“I better get back to them,” Bobby said. “I know you've never been into the group thing, so I'll see you later. Oh! You're coming to my Christmas Eve party, right?”

Bruce's mouth twitched, but he said, “I'll be there.”

* * *

Halfway through the parade and halfway to Robinson Park, Bruce stopped for food at one of the trucks parked around the corner from the main street. The customer in front of him turned around, and Bruce was face-to-face with Harvey Dent, just about to take a huge bite out of a folded slice of pizza. He looked up at Bruce in surprise, hesitated, and then took the bite regardless. He mumbled a greeting, and stood aside, waiting for Bruce to order. Bruce took a pretzel and a bottled water. They walked together from the truck.

“Billionaire Bruce Wayne, eating out of a food truck,” Harvey said once he was done chewing. “Wow, that's got to be the Eighth Wonder of the World.”

Bruce gave him a look. Harvey innocently chewed more pizza.

“I'm glad I ran into you, actually,” Harvey said. “I've been thinking about calling you.”

“Is there something you want to talk about?”

“No, not particularly,” Harvey said. He chewed slowly. “It's just that … I don't know. Maybe I do want to have one of our long, rambling conversations. I keep looking through my contacts and trying to find someone to just go to a bar with, someone I can remember or stand or actually want to be around. I just kept coming back to you, to your number.”

That unwelcome, inappropriate charge of hope assaulted Bruce again. He had given up fighting it. So long as he did not act on his desires, it would be fine.

“Well, Harvey, I don't want to say you're a gold digger, but … ”

Harvey groaned, snorting at the attempt at a joke. Bruce wished he was able to digest pop culture better. Perhaps he should be listening to the parade music more closely.

“Sorry, I don't have much of a sense of humor,” Bruce said. “I really don't know what to say. I enjoy your company, too. I would like to consider us friends. But I don't want you to confuse our friendship. I _am_ attracted to you, very much.”

“Would I confuse our friendship?” Harvey asked with a knowing, pizza grease-shiny smile. “Or would you?”

“I would normally say that I would never cross that line, but I've crossed lines I've set before,” Bruce said, thinking of Lawton. “It doesn't happen often, but when I do fall in love, it becomes my focus. Love has pushed me past my limits, past my defenses, my standards and morals, past everything really. I've spent my life controlling it, after my parents died, but that's the one thing I haven't been able to control.”

Harvey nodded, though Bruce wondered if he had been listening closely. Harvey had been devouring his pizza slice in quick, large bites, and now he took a long sip of soda.

“Are you saying you could love me, Bruce?”

Bruce almost choked on his water. He stopped walking, and Harvey stood in front of him. He finished the last crust of the pizza, wiped his hand on the napkin he had held it with, crumbled it, and threw the trash into the can next to them.

“So, what is it?” Harvey asked. “Are you afraid of falling in love with me, Bruce?”

“Harvey … ” Bruce smiled, shaking his head. “Could you please not act like I'm on the stand in court? Please?”

Harvey laughed, patting Bruce's shoulder. They resumed walking. Bruce was grateful for the break in tension.

“I'm sorry, old habits,” Harvey said. “Brutal honesty, laying all the facts on the table. I like to sort through all the gray until everything is as black and white as possible.”

“Not everything fits inside the lines between black and white,” Bruce said. “I used to think it did, but it doesn't. Life is messy as hell, Harvey. I'm not in a place where I can handle any more complications. And you're _married_.”

“Who are you trying to convince here?”

“I don't know,” Bruce said, losing patience. “Do you _need_ convincing?”

“You mean, would I want to be more than friends with you?” Harvey shrugged. “I don't know. I usually prefer women, but I might make an exception. I have before. You never know until you try at something, but you're a handsome guy, you're good to be around.”

“Harvey, we can't,” Bruce said. “An affair would blow your career and your marriage apart.”

“I know,” Harvey said. “You brought it up, though, and I wanted to be straight with you. Ha, that's probably not the right word to use just now, but you know what I mean.”

This time, Bruce groaned at Harvey's joke. Harvey grinned shamelessly.

“Anyway, we'll forget about it for now,” Harvey said. “Let's just be friends and forget about benefits. I don't want to scare you away. You're the only person I can stand anymore other than Jim.”

“I don't scare easily, Harvey.”

“Good, neither do I,” Harvey said. “Don't mind me, I'm just in a weird mood. I hate this damn parade. I hate having to put the important cases aside while I shake hands and pretend to be enjoying this big damn party.”

“Gilda didn't want to come?”

“This kind of crowd would just put her on edge,” Harvey explained. “It puts _me_ on edge to be so useless. It wouldn't have been fun. Did you bring anyone?”

“No, I'm not seeing anyone.”

“You ever gonna come out publicly?”

“Not if I can help it,” Bruce said. “If I had come out, we'd be surrounded by paparazzi right now, and by tonight everyone on the internet would be convincing themselves that we're having a torrid gay love affair.”

Harvey coughed. “Ah, yeah, I can understand why you're reluctant. People always say they don't care, but they talk more about certain things and certain people. It's why I never came out as bisexual in college or anywhere else. It's just annoying to be 'that person', you know? I already had enough of that, growing up with my father. I was 'that kid', 'that poor kid', the one who the whole block hears hollering when his father beats him. I don't need any more labels thrown at me. Besides, what's another secret to keep, right?”

“Do you have a lot of secrets?”

“Oh yeah,” Harvey laughed. “There's a whole other side of Harvey Dent the world will never see. Except for you. I don't know what it is about you. I never trust billionaires, never. I hate them. I hate everything about Gotham's elite. I don't hate you. Huh. I hope I'm not losing my mind and making a mistake here. I trust you, but _can I_ trust you, Bruce? Do I even know who you really are?”

Bruce thought of his one big secret: being the Batman. He thought it was about time for Harvey Dent and Batman meet. Depending upon how that went …

 _Would I ever let anyone in that far?_ Bruce wondered. _Let them know that I'm Batman? Could I trust Harvey with that? He's a good man, not like Lawton. He's let me in, shouldn't I return that trust?_

“You know things about me that would compromise my lifestyle,” Bruce said. “If you don't know if you can trust me, just remember that if I would ever tell your secrets, you could always tell mine.”

“Mutually assured destruction,” Harvey snorted. “Guess that's as good as anything gets these days.”

“You can trust me, Harvey.”

“We'll see.” Harvey glanced around the crowd, and looked more sharply at someone. “There's a face you can't trust.”

Bruce followed his gaze. A somewhat plump, short man was watching the floats intently, though he gave no sign of enjoying the procession. He was dressed in a black suit, complete with a vest over his crisp white shirt, and he wore, oddly enough, a top hat. He carried something Bruce at first thought was a walking stick, then realized was an umbrella with a silver handle carved into a shape Bruce could not make out. He looked to be in his mid-thirties, and he had thick, slick black hair beneath the hat. His eyes were the palest shade of blue, looked imperiously out at the crowd above a beak-like nose.

“He might not look like much, but he's been coming up in the Gotham criminal underground,” Harvey said. “Oswald Chesterfield Cobblepot. He built up a lot of connections in his hometown, London, and then set his sights overseas. He hasn't outright challenged Falcone's 'Roman Empire' or the Maroni crime family, but he's testing them. Little bastard is going to end up igniting a war. They won't deal with him because they see him as one of the city's 'freaks', but Cobblepot's not insane. He knows what he's doing. It's just that he looks a little off and calls himself the 'Penguin'.”

Bruce filed the information away for later study, and took a good, long look at Oswald. The handle of the umbrella was carved into a penguin, he realized.

“Speak of the other devils,” Harvey muttered under his breath.

The Falcone family were standing on the corner: recently released from prison Sofia AKA 'Gigante' Falcone, a stately and severe woman, her nervous-looking brother Alberto, and the suave, handsome head of their organization, Carmine 'The Roman' Falcone. On the corner on the opposite side of the street was Salvatore 'The Boss' Maroni and some of his associates.

“The whole damn city is out here,” Harvey said wistfully. “If only we could just run a raid and take the garbage out, thug by thug.”

“I hope you don't mean that literally.”

“Take out, like _take them out_?” Harvey asked. “I don't know. No. I'm not a murderer. I didn't mean it like that. I think.”

“You think?”

Their eyes met, and they laughed. The conversation turned to more mundane things. They walked together all through the rest of the parade and the city.

* * *

The day was clear, so fake snow was blowing through Robinson Park. Silver tinsel was thrown onto every tree in sight, setting the park shimmering in the waning daylight. There were many displays throughout the park, and tents with portable heaters offering refuge from the cold. Food trucks were parked outside the park, and vendors were set up inside. The people who were not driving or walking home to freshen up before the Frost Ball got underway were lining up at the many portable bathrooms outside the park.

Bruce strolled through the park while Harvey went to find and catch up with Commissioner Gordon. Bobby and his friends had not arrived yet. He suspected they had been some of those too posh to freshen up in public bathrooms and had driven back home to prepare for the Frost Ball, as did the two mob families. Harvey and Gordon were standing on the stage as it was decorated and prepared for tonight's tree-lighting ceremony. They were talking seriously, Gordon occasionally pointing around the park.

In the zoo, Bruce noticed two familiar figures. Selina Kyle was watching the lions in their cage with a sad look on her face. Thomas Blake was not with her. At the Antarctic display, Oswald Cobblepot was watching the penguins with a sedate, admiring smile on his face.

“Didn't want to go back and freshen up?” Bruce asked Ms. Kyle.

“I'm fresh as ever,” Selina said with that wry smile on her lips. She looked Bruce up and down. “You look about the same. Mr. Dent must be good for you.”

“Excuse me?”

“I saw you two walking.”

“And you can tell exactly what from watching two men walk?”

“You can tell everything from the way people walk,” Selina said, turning back to the lions. “Some are slow and deliberate, some are just slow with laziness or lack of care. Some people walk with grace, others with caution, still more go everywhere in a self-important rush. You walk in the exact same brisk pace regardless of how long you've walked, your posture is disciplined and straight. Harvey starts off that way, but he looks at the sidewalk once in a while. His shoulders slump a bit. He stops walking and faces someone when he has something important to say.”

Bruce raised his eyebrows. “And what can you tell from all that?”

“The confidence comes from your background, obviously, and your good looks,” Selina said with a twist of her red lips. “Your posture and control mean you've had physical training, a lot of it. So does the fact that you keep the same pace. You're physically disciplined and controlled, but it's natural, not affected or uptight. There's a strength in it. You're a fighter.”

“I have had martial arts training,” Bruce said. “That's not bad. Harvey?”

“He tries to be what you simply are, but it's an effort,” Selina said. “He tends to fall into a 'keep your head down' posture, a habit ingrained into everyone that grew up in a hard neighborhood without having the protection of being powerful or popular. The slump of his shoulders, the way they almost hunch sometimes, means he's been victimized at some point in his life. His stopping to speak means that he's had to fight to be heard, and it's important to him to see someone's face fully to gauge their reaction.”

“Were you a fortune teller in a past life?”

“I was a lot of things in my past lives,” Selina said. She turned to Bruce. “That wasn't what clued me. It was the look in your eyes when you looked at Mr. Dent: tender, protective, afraid. But I knew you were gay when we met.”

“That early?”

“I'm not an unattractive woman,” Selina said, not bragging but stating a fact. “I saw that I intrigued you and that you liked me, but there was nothing sexual in it. You assessed me with your eyes the way people assess a pleasing piece of furniture. Believe me, I could tell.”

“You know more about me than I know about you,” Bruce said. “It's an unfair advantage, Ms. Kyle.”

“Well, life can be unfair, Bruce. I have to be somewhere,” Selina said. “I'll give you one question.”

“Okay,” Bruce said. He looked from her to the lions, and back. “Why don't you tell me what attracts a woman that loves animals to a big game hunter like Thomas Blake?”

Selina raised her face, faint surprise lighting her eyes. “How do you know I love animals? I could be looking at them with a hunter's eye.”

“You could have been, but you weren't,” Bruce said. “You're looking at these lions with the same protective tenderness you said I looked at Harvey with. When Blake mentioned hunting lions in Africa, your eye twitched.”

“Hm. So, I have a tell.” Selina touched the corner of her eye. “Cats. I love cats.”

“Then why date Blake?”

“He has … things that I need,” Selina said vaguely. “I have things that he wants. It benefits us both. For now.”

“For now?”

Selina put a hand on Bruce's shoulder, smiling beautifully.

“For now.” She contemplated Bruce for a minute, and then leaned up into a curious, probing kiss. “Hmm. Too bad.”

Bruce stared at her, speechless for once.

“Well, that should give you hetero cred for the next few weeks,” Selina said. She nodded at a group of paparazzi outside the zoo, snapping away at them with telescoping lenses. “If you ever need a beard, it might be interesting to play house with you—for a price.”

Selina took her hand from him and walked away backwards.

“See you later, Bruce.” She turned on her red-soled high heels, and strode out of the zoo.

Meanwhile, Oswald Cobblepot had wandered over.

“I'd play house with a lady like that anytime,” he said to Bruce. He glanced at the lions. “Pity she likes the cats, though. I hate them, personally.”

“I saw you watching the penguins,” Bruce said. “Birds, is it?”

“Yeah, birds,” Oswald admitted with a chuckle. Despite his gentlemanly appearance, he had a distinct cockney accent roughening his voice. “Mum kept an aviary when I was growing up. You?”

Bruce thought quickly. He had a personal admiration for bats, but this was not an opportune time to be a fan of the flying creatures. He recalled something Bobby had said once, and decided to use it.

“Dogs,” he said. “They're simple, loyal. Everyone loves dogs.”

“I don't care for them myself, but to each their own,” Oswald said. “They can be useful little beasts, though, can't they?”

“They can.” Bruce held his hand out. “Bruce Wayne. And you are?”

“Oswald Cobblepot.” He shook Bruce's hand with his smaller pudgy one. “I knew who you were, Bruce. Don't think there's a soul in Gotham that wouldn't know you. Nice to finally meet you, lad.”

“And you,” Bruce said. “You're in the shipping business, is it?”

“Oh, let's cut the proverbial crap, shall we?” Oswald suggested cheerfully. “If the lovely piece of kitty tail was right about you and Dent, you'll already know who I am. The Avenging Apollo has his eyes on me, right? So you'll know what I am, eh? The Penguin?”

“I do.”

“Well, lad, if there's anything you want or need from such a figure, I'm your man,” Oswald said. “I've already set your old friend up a few times. Bobby, is it? The Halloran boy. Heh heh. The lad sure loves his cocaine, don't he?”

Bruce felt a cold wash of anger towards the diminutive upstart crime boss. He smiled coolly and said, “Well, I'll keep that in mind.”

“You do that, lad,” the Penguin said. “Well. Enjoy the ball.”

“You, too.”

Bruce left the zoo, wandering toward the main crowd. The Frost Ball was beginning in earnest now, and many of the people who had driven back home were arriving back, walking the blue carpet rolled out to the park entrance.

Bruce noticed Harvey Bullock talking to a man he did not know. He discreetly wandered in that direction, hovering in the cover of a tree within earshot of the talking.

“What are you talking about, Nashton?” Bullock was asking the other man, a redhead. “What message are you sending to Batman? I don't want this thing getting out, you know. If Gordon or Dent gets wind of what we're doing—”

“Relax. _We're_ not doing anything,” Nashton said flatly. “ _I_ am sending Batman a little message. I want to make him curious before we meet. I've done my research on him, you see. I think I see a kindred spirit in Batman.”

“You're _nothing like_ the Bat!” Bullock snapped. “I told ya!”

“Batman solves crimes,” Nashton said, ignoring Bullock. “He doesn't just snatch criminals off the street and tie them up for the pigs.”

“You are one of the pigs!” Bullock said, sounding like a man on the verge of dying of an aneurysm. He scowled. “A _cop_ , I mean.”

“Not really, not yet,” Nashton said. “Anyway, as I was saying, Batman is a detective. He's a very fine detective. He solves puzzles, like I do. He may even be the second brightest man in Gotham, next to me, of course.”

“Oh, of course,” Bullock said dryly.

“I'm intrigued,” Nashton said. “I want to make him notice me. A true battle of wits, Sherlock against Moriarty. It will be truly epic.”

“Don't use that word, I hate that word,” groaned Bullock. “Listen, Nashton, just don't do anything stupid.”

Nashton looked at the man queerly.

“Fine, you're never stupid, you're a genius, all right,” sighed Bullock. “Don't do anything risky.”

“I won't take any miscalculated risks,” Nashton said. “I never do.”

Bruce quickly left the area when the two men parted. He took out his phone.

“Alfred? It's me. If you don't mind, could you get me everything about a man named 'Nashton' working as a civilian at the GCPD? Thank you, Alfred.”


	9. After All (Epilogue)

Bruce eventually found Harvey Dent again, and they spent the rest of the party together. Harvey was drinking more than Bruce thought he should, but he was welcoming the holiday season alone, so Bruce said nothing. Soon they were standing with the crowd, counting down until the Gotham Tree (so it was dubbed) was lit.

Alfred had sent Bruce the details concerning Bullock's mysterious cohort. He was Edward Nashton, a man a few years older than Bruce, the head of the GCPD IT department and occasional internet crime consultant. Edward had rolled into Gotham some years back with the carnival, where he ran petty scams. Bullock had dragged him in a few times for rigging street games. Edward's life changed when Gordon arrested him after linking him to an internet hacker, thief, and pirate who went by the handle 'eNigma'. Gordon took pity on the smart young man, and started him working at the GPD instead of sending him to jail. It had not taken very long for Nashton to take over the IT department and worm his way into consulting.

At the moment, 'eNigma' was practically bouncing on his heels with anticipation. Bruce knew that the message he was sending Batman would have to do with the lighting ceremony. He hoped it was not anything dangerous or violent. He had had his fill of deadly conspiracy plots.

“ONE!”

The tree lights did not come on. Murmurs and a few laughs rippled through the crowd. The announcer on stage looked embarrassed and angry. He covered his microphone with a hand and shouted some things to the crew behind the stage.

The lights came on, and everyone was about to applaud, then stopped. Only the green lights had come on, bathing the crowd and stage in an eerie emerald glow. Bruce glanced at Edward. He was beaming. He searched the crowd for Bullock and found him. The man was turning red and purple, an ugly hue when mixed with the green light.

White lights came on in the center of the tree. They blinked on and off, forming the words one at a time, showing each word for thirty seconds:

WHO

IS

BATMAN?

At the last, only the question mark remained. It glowed into purple, and then all the lights suddenly blinked on. The sudden change left the impression of the question mark burned into the crowd's eyes for a few moments. Everyone blinked, some people rubbed their eyes. A clamor of talking rose up, and then everyone applauded. Some people took up the question in a chant, others shouted out in a clamor:

“Who is Batman?”

“Yeah, who _is_ Batman?”

“Yeah!”

Bruce shut his eyes and left them closed as long as possible. This was a nightmare. He glared across the crowd at Edward Nashton, knowing he would have to spend the holiday season persuading this new threat to give up his little agenda.

Bruce felt a weight against his arm, and looked down. Harvey was leaning heavily on him, swaying on his feet. If they were around like this much longer, they would make the gossip sites within the hour. Bruce took a hold on Harvey's arm and led him away from the crowd, into a dark spot in the park's greenery.

“I think it might be time to leave the ball,” Bruce told him. “My car is outside the park. I can give you a ride home.”

“Yeah, I'm done,” Harvey said. “Can you believe the idiots in this town? Who's Batman? Who cares! He's the one mask that actually does something productive. Now we're going to have to talk about this stupid little prank to every so-called journalist that caught a video for their YouTube channel. What a waste of freaking time.”

“Never mind it now, Harvey,” Bruce said. “You just forget everything. It's not important.”

“Is it hot right now? I'm hot.” Harvey loosened his tie and removed his coat.

“It's freezing,” Bruce said, putting Harvey back into his coat. “You're hot because you're drunk.”

“Am I?”

“Very.”

“Good,” Harvey chuckled. “It's a day for uselessness, right? Best way to be useless.”

They reached the waiting car. Once inside, Harvey removed his coat and jacket. Bruce told Alfred to turn the heat up. The privacy glass was up between the driver's seat and the back. Bruce was almost tempted to tell Alfred to leave it down. Being in such close proximity to a handsome man with impaired judgment did not seem to be the brightest idea Bruce had ever had.

“Oh hey, the car with the bar,” Harvey said, reaching for the bottles. “This little bar is probably worth more than my house, right? Must be nice. Must be really swell to drink enough money to feed half the hungry kids in Gotham for a year.”

“I don't drink much, Harvey.”

“Oh now that is a crime,” Harvey said, pouring two glasses of scotch. “That is a real crime, having all these valuables here and not even enjoying them. Have a drink with me. Come on. I didn't even see you have anything at the Frost Ball.”

Bruce had an epiphany that social drinking was incredibly difficult to avoid. He took the glass from Harvey and took a bracing gulp of liquor. Fortunately, he had alcohol-absorbing pills to help keep his system as undamaged as possible, and would take some later.

“To the drunk and useless.” Harvey clinked his glass to Bruce's, twice. “And to the rich and useless. To all the useless.”

Harvey laughed until he shifted into moodiness again. Bruce wondered about these shifts, their suddenness, the severe ups and downs. He wondered if the man might be bipolar. Then Harvey leaned his head on Bruce's shoulder, and Bruce had other concerns.

“We should be useless together,” Harvey said. He moved closer to Bruce, his head nestled in the crook of Bruce's neck. “We should be useless together. Rich and useless, and drunk and useless.”

“You're not a drunk, Harvey,” Bruce said, trying to move away from him. There was nowhere to go, so he gave up, putting an arm around him. “You're not useless, either. You'll take antacid in the morning, drink your coffee, eat whatever on-the-go garbage you always eat, and you'll be back at the GCPD. You'll put your cases together. You'll get your convictions.”

“Yeah, and the sky will turn purple, the streets will be clean, and we'll move forward towards world peace,” Harvey said. “I'll try my best, but it ain't gonna happen.”

Bruce realized that he hadn't told Alfred to drive anywhere.

“Let's get you home,” Bruce said. He pressed the button to communicate with the driver when the sound-blocking privacy glass was up. “Tell Alfred your address, and—”

“No, no, let's not go anywhere,” Harvey said, slinging his arm across Bruce's chest. “Let's just stay here. Or drive nowhere. It doesn't matter. You can afford the gas, right?”

“Actually the car is—” Bruce inhaled sharply as Harvey's lips kissed his neck. “—electric.”

“Green as your money, huh?”

“Harvey, stop.”

“Is it too tacky to talk about money? Am I too tacky for you, Bruce?”

Bruce took him by the shoulders and sat him up. Harvey squinted blearily at him.

“What the hell is this?” Bruce asked. “What is it? Do you want me? Do you even like me? Do you hate me? What the hell is the matter with you?”

“I like ya, Bruce,” Harvey said, his city accent very thick now that he was unguarded. He patted Bruce's arm. “I just don't like _what_ you are.”

“And what am I?”

“A spoiled rich brat,” Harvey said frankly. He scrubbed the back of his fist across his nose. “I know your parents died, but every year you spent with them was worth spendin', right? You were, what? You were loved and given everything you could ever want. You never had to worry about … when your father will just blow his money gamblin' and leave the house without power or heat or food. You never had to wonder when you're going to be beaten so badly you won't even be able to walk to school in the morning. You grew up in that gigantic house, away from sirens and crying and screaming and bullies with knives and guns. No matter what this city took from you, it can never take that from you. Never. And I guess I just hate that … that you have those memories. That you had that and I never had, never will.”

“You have a wife and everything you've built for yourself _now_ , Harvey,” Bruce told him. “You have good memories now.”

“Yeah and the city is taking those things away from me,” Harvey said. “My wife is a zombie. My life is constantly in danger. I could fall off the razor-thin line I'm walking professionally and lose my entire career.”

“It's that way for anyone at any given time,” Bruce said. “You said you envy my good memories. So just forget everything and think about your own. Hold onto them.”

“I can't!” Harvey exclaimed. “Don't you get that? I can't think about anything good without thinking about how it's going to feel to lose it! I'm scared. Goddamnit!”

Harvey kicked the back of the driver and passenger seats violently. The bottles and glasses in the bar rattled. Harvey hit the car door with his arms. The assault on the car lasted a few minutes. Harvey was panting by the end, broken into a light sweat. He leaned back in his seat and threw an arm over his eyes.

Bruce took up the phone to speak to the driver. “Alfred? Are you all right?”

“I'm rather shaken, but not too stirred, sir.”

Bruce smiled, and set the phone down. He turned to Harvey, wondering what to do about him. He lifted the man's arm off of his eyes. Harvey looked at him tiredly. His eyes were glinting, but dry.

“What the hell do you want from me, Bruce?” Harvey asked. “You're a businessman. You're smart, honest. Just tell me. Tell me why you keep playing the part of my therapist. Why do you keep putting up with all this crap? Just to be friends? Because I'm the DA? What is it?”

“It's … you, Harvey.” Bruce looked down at his hands, and took one of Harvey's in his own. “It's only because it's you.”

Harvey squeezed his hand. Bruce frowned, and took his other hand. He turned them both over.

“Your wedding band?”

Harvey frowned, studying his fingers.

“I must have dropped it at the Ball.” He looked out the car window. “Shit.”

“We can go back,” Bruce said. “Look around, check the Lost and Found?”

Bruce reached across for the car door but Harvey grabbed his arm.

“No,” he said. “No, please. Let's just stay here. I just … I just want to be here.”

“Okay.”

They sat in silence. Harvey began to laugh. Bruce frowned at him, and he laughed harder.

“This isn't funny.”

“Yeah it is,” Harvey said, laughing harder. “What the hell are we? One drunk and miserable married District Attorney from a hard knock life. One tragically orphaned gay billionaire. I mean, it's funny. It's so stupid, it's funny.”

“It's sad that you think it is.”

“That it's funny?”

“No. That it's stupid.” Bruce rested a hand on Harvey's knee. “It's not stupid to care about someone. It's not stupid for people to be able to connect regardless of whatever they are or however their lives went. It isn't stupid to throw everything out but the person sitting next to you.”

Bruce was surprised at his words, and even more surprised to realize he believed them. He had been bitterly chiding himself for his affair with Floyd Lawton for days, but he had to admit that he did not regret it. It had to be over, but Bruce was still willing to take a chance. He wondered if this was good or bad.

“It isn't stupid,” Bruce repeated. “Maybe your cynicism is the stupid thing.”

Harvey raised his eyebrows.

“So, Bruce Wayne has a spine after all,” he laughed. “Stupid? To be cynical? In this city? Says the guy whose parents were shot right in front of him?”

“Harvey, don't.”

“He's getting out next year,” Harvey said. “Joe Chill. Did you know that? It's been twenty years, Bruce. Good behavior, no additional charges. He'll be back on the streets.”

Bruce's heart skipped a beat. He swallowed down the emotion with difficulty. In that instant, he almost hated Harvey Dent. Harvey saw the look in his eyes and smiled.

“There it is,” he said, taking Bruce's face in both hands. “Who am I to talk to you like this, right? How dare I mention the sainted Martha and Thomas Wayne, right? Not so fun slumming with me, is it, Bruce?”

Bruce impatiently pushed Harvey's hands off his face. He held his arms by the wrists.

“You don't hate me, Harvey,” Bruce told him. “You don't even hate all the faceless billionaires. You're projecting your self-hatred onto me. You asked me why I'm playing therapist for you. Because I have a thing for—” He remembered Lawton's words. “—for handsome men with sad stories and daddy issues. It's a cliché, I know, but I do. I want to figure you out. I want to know you. I want—”

“To fuck me?”

Harvey used Bruce's moment of dismay to kiss him. It was focused and intense. Bruce felt the charge he had felt when he first laid eyes on Harvey, but far, far stronger. Bruce's hands tightened around the man's wrists as he was burned through by desire. He was kissing him back then, bruising his wrists, pulling him closer.

“Harvey,” Bruce managed hoarsely. “We can't. You're married.”

“Not right now,” Harvey said, waving his ring-less finger. He poured two more drinks. “It's just a kiss. Come on. Have another toast with me.”

Bruce shook his head, but knew he was helpless. He took the glass. Harvey had an odd way of taking charge of a situation, even when he was the vulnerable one. Floyd had been looking for someone to take control of him, but Harvey seemed to relish the power struggle, the back and forth. Bruce wondered if even he knew whether he wanted to be the one on top or on the bottom.

Harvey tipped his glass against Bruce's.

“Here's to the person sitting next to you.”

“To taking chances. Even if they are stupid.”

Harvey's smile widened, flashing his perfect teeth.

“Yeah. I like that.”

In the front of the car in the driver's seat, Alfred sighed. He could not make out the conversation between the men, but he had a fair idea of what was transpiring in the back of the car. Bruce never could turn down a handsome man given to violent impulses. He wondered if that was Bruce's way of subduing his own urges, to be with men he could vicariously battle them through.

Alfred put his noise-canceling headphones on and turned on the holiday radio station. He looked out the window at the brilliant Gotham Tree, and smiled. Whatever else was happening, it was the holiday season. He thought of ghosts past, present, and future. He thought of holidays past and holidays hopefully to come. He laid his head back and put his faith in the man he had helped raise, while he reminisced to the melodic “What Child Is This?”.

The world would take care of itself, and Christmas would come and go. Alfred had some concerns for Bruce, entangled now with the handsome District Attorney, but he was predominantly relieved that he was apart from Floyd Lawton. Bruce had seen more than enough tragedy written on a bullet.

**End**

_Man is an obstacle, sad as the clown_

_So hold onto nothing, and he won't let you down_

_Some people are marching together and some on their own_

_Quite alone_

_Others are running, the smaller ones crawl_

_But some sit in silence, they're just older children_

_That's all_

_After all_

– David Bowie, “After All”


End file.
